
^ J7~ ffirfyrieA 



SERMONS 



BY 



Retf. Charles ,/Wery Jlolmes, D. D, LL. D. 



OF THE 



METHODIST EPISCOPAL CHURCH. 



<*' 



.6' 






PITTSBURGH. PA. : 

JOSEPH HORNER, 524 PENN AVENUE. 

METHODIST BOOK DEPOSITORY. 



[the library 

OF CONGRESS 
WASHINGTON 






COPYRIGHT, 1897. 
BY GEORGE S. HOLMES. 



Percy F. Smith Printing and 
Lithographing Company, 
Pittsburgh, Pa. 



CONTENTS. 



PAGE 

Rev. Charles Avery Holmes, D. D. , LL. D 3 

Sermon I. II. Timothy, 1:12 8 

Sermon II. Exodus, 3:14 19 

Sermon III. John, 8:58 29 

Sermon IV. Revelation, 22:21 39 

Sermon V. Genesis, 45:27 51 

Sermon VI. John, 12:24 59 

Sermon VII. Psalm 3:4 70 

Sermon VIII. I. Timothy, 3:14, 15, 16 81 

Sermon IX. Genesis, 9:13 91 

Sermon X. Galatians, 6:17 97 

Sermon XI. Judges, 1:15 107 

Sermon XII. I^uke, 2:15 113 

Sermon XIII. Luke, 2:28 121 

Sermon XIV. Deuteronomy, 33:25 128 

Sermon XV. Matthew, 6:28 136 

Sermon XVI. I. Corinthians, 11:20 148 

Sermon XVII. Revelation, 19:3 152 

Sermon XVIII. Isaiah, 22:24 162 

Sermon XIX. John, 11:48 170 

Sermon XX. Nehemiah, 6:11 181 

Sermon XXI. Hebrews, 13:13 191 

Sermon XXII. Numbers, 23:10 199 

Sermon XXIII. II. Corinthians, 8:9 , 212 

Sermon XXIV. Amos, 8:11 225 

Sermon XXV. John, 14:12 237 

Sermon XXVI. Deuteronomy, 1:25 249 

Sermon XXVII. Job, 14:10 and II. Corinthians, 5:8 256 

Sermon XXVIII. I. Corinthians, 15:26 265 

Sermon XXIX. Matthew, 25:31, 32, 33, 34 275 

Sermon XXX. I. Thessalonians, 4:18 284 

Sermon XXXI. I. Thessalonians, 2:4 295 

« 



REV. CHARLES AVERY HOLMES, D. D., LL. D. 



Charles Avery Holmes, son of Rev. George S. and Mary 
Steelman Holmes, was born in Middletown, Washington County, 
Pennsylvania, on the Second day of June, 1827. 

His father was a minister of the Methodist Episcopal Church, 
and he followed in the same line. He was thoroughly educated, 
being early trained by his father to diligent habits of study. In 
the year 1844, being then only seventeen years of age, he grad- 
uated from the Western University at Pittsburgh. From that 
institution he received the degree of 1,1,. D. in 1893 — the degree 
of Doctor of Divinity having been conferred upon him many years 
previously by Waynesburg College. 

Under the ministry of his father, he was converted, when less 
than twelve years of age, and united with the Church in Steuben- 
ville, Ohio. The soundness of his conversion was beyond all 
doubt or question, and the power of it remained with him all 
through life. In 1847, when he was twenty years old, he was 
received into the Pittsburgh Conference, and began his work in the 
ministry. In that work he continued without a break until the 
time of his death. 

The various charges which he served in his ministry, and the 
years for which he was appointed to them, were as follows : 1847, 
Ohio Circuit (as junior preacher, with Rev. J. J. Moffitt as 
his senior colleague) ; 1848, Smithfield Circuit, Ohio (as junior 
preacher, with Rev. Wm. Tipton as his senior colleague) ; 1849- 
50, Cadiz Circuit (as junior preacher, with Rev. J. J. Moffitt as his 
senior colleague); 185 1, Coshocton; 1852-53, South Street 
Church, Steubenville ; 1854, Wellsburg, West Virginia ; 1855-56, 

3 



Washington, Pennsylvania ; 1857-59, Presiding Elder of Wash- 
ington District; 1860-61, Christ Church, Pittsburgh; 1862-63, 
Presiding Elder of Uniontown District ; 1864-66, Smith- 
field Street Church, Pittsburgh ; 1867-68, President of Iowa 
Wesley an University, and Pastor of Main Street Church, Mount 
Pleasant, Iowa; 1869-71, Sewickley, Pennsylvania; 1872-73, 
North Avenue Church, Allegheny ; 1874-76, Grace Church, 
Harrisburg ; 1877 (March), Pine Street Church, Williamsport ; 
1877 (October), and 1878, Trinity Church, Louisville, Kentucky; 
1879, Washington, Pennsylvania ; 1880-82, Butler Street Church, 
Pittsburgh ; 1883, First Church, Oakland, California ; 1884-86, 
Presiding Elder of Pittsburgh District, Pennsylvania ; 1887-90, 
Union Church, Allegheny ; 1891-93, Arch Street Church, 
Allegheny ; 1894-96, Beaver. 

He was a delegate to the General Conferences of i860, 1864, 
1868 and 1872. He was a member of the General Book Com- 
mittee of the Church from 1864 to 1868, and a member of the 
Board of Education from 1872 to 1876. 

On the fourteenth of November, 1850, he was married to 
Tempe, daughter of William Tingley, of Cadiz, Ohio. Never did 
man have more perfect wife ; and his home and family were 
constantly in the heart and the mind of Dr. Holmes. Noted as 
he was as a man of fame and good works, one of the most distin- 
guishing features of his character was his loving devotion to his 
wife and children. And when, on the twenty -fifth of August, 
1889, he saw the partner of his life precede him to the home 
beyond, it was with the memory of a life of truest affection upon 
earth that he looked forward to the reunion of the life which is in 
Heaven. 

Dr. Holmes was a man of unusual strength of character. 



He was firmness itself, wherever principle was involved. But he 
was inexpressibly tender toward all whom he could serve. Gen- 
erous beyond all measure, liberal and broad-hearted, as he was, he 
could not tolerate the thought of wrong. He was kind and char- 
itable with the erring ; but meanness in any form he thoroughly 
despised. None ever heard him make special profession of his own 
attainment in religious life, nor declare any goodness in himself ; 
and none who knew him failed to recognize the fact that he was 
an intensely religious man who ' ' walked with God. ' ' Extremely 
unselfish, his life was devoted to the interests of others and not 
to his own. Of himself he thought last of all. Constant in his 
ministry to all who suffered or were in want, and open-handed and 
open-hearted to all who met him in the wide circles of friend- 
ship, he fairly won for himself the reputation of a * ' man of love. " 

His was the superiority of a righteous man to fear of any 
kind. Neither frown nor threat could swerve him from his prin- 
ciples. No force of opposition was ever great enough to make him 
tremble. In the dark days of our National history, his voice was 
ever heard in support of the flag of his country ; and his labors in 
behalf of his country, when his life was imperilled by what he 
said and did, gave him fame as one who counted deeds of loyalty 
superior to thoughts of personal safety. In matters of political 
and religious interest and principle, he was outspoken and positive 
in support of what he deemed the right. But, while earnest and 
forcible in his uncompromising support of that in which he 
believed, he was ever courteous and generous toward all honest 
opponents. And it was no uncommon thing for those who had 
honestly differed with him, to become his warm friends and 
admirers. 

Possessed of remarkable intellectual gifts, and a life-long 



student, he was essentially a scholar. His acquaintance with the 
world of literature was a profound intimacy. His reading was 
wide and universal. What he read, he remembered ; and he had 
a wonderful faculty for adapting and making use of what he 
acquired in study. A natural orator, he cultivated all his graces, 
and was a speaker of unusual eloquence and force. He was a 
master of the art of enunciation. With a voice powerful, but 
delightfully controlled and modulated, sweet, persuasive and con- 
vincing, he never failed to attract and interest and impress his 
hearers. 

Although always a ready speaker, never failing for thought 
or its verbal expression on the most sudden emergency or demand 
for speech, he invariably gave careful preparation to every subject 
and occasion upon which he knew that he was to speak. He 
deemed every occasion worthy of the best that he could do. 
And his habits of study and practiced memory equipped him for 
those times when he was called upon for public utterance without 
previous notice. 

The sermons contained in this volume are selected from the 
large number which he wrote in full. They are printed from his 
manuscripts, word for word as he wrote them, without change of 
any kind. There has been no work for an editor, and no altera- 
tions have been made. The one difficulty encountered, has been in 
the matter of choosing from the immense wealth of sermonic pro- 
ductions which he left in his desk — each sermon seeming equally 
worthy of publication with all the others. These which are 
printed were all delivered in the regular course of his work in 
the ministry. 

The sermon which closes this collection is the last one preached 
by him. It was on Sunday morning, February twenty-eighth, 

6 



1897, that he delivered it. Ill for more than a year, and much of 
the time suffering extreme weakness and great pain, he had re- 
mained at his work. For some time he had seemed to be in some 
ways improving in health, but was growing weaker. Upon the 
morning named, he stood in his pulpit at Beaver, Pennsylvania, 
and preached as usual, with no thought that he was finishing his 
work. When within a few minutes of the close of the sermon, he 
suddenly became so weak that he was compelled to stop. In a few 
moments the sense of f aintness had passed from him ; but from 
that hour on he lost strength, and in two weeks his life had worn 
out and he had gone to his eternal rest. Monday morning, the 
fifteenth of March, 1897, at twenty minutes before four o'clock, 
he quietly passed in sleep from this world to the world in which 
there is neither pain nor weakness. 

A man of continual labor and unswerving fidelity, having 
spent a long life in the loving and unfaltering proclamation of the 
Gospel, he did not realize that, in exhorting the members of his 
congregation to a proper administration of the trust committed to 
them, he was ending his own ministry in the world with an expo- 
sition of words which fittingly characterized his life. But no 
words could better declare the sincerity of purpose and the earnest 
zeal of his life, than those which formed his last text : " As we 
were allowed of God to be put in trust with the Gospel, even so 
we speak ; not as pleasing men, but God which trieth our hearts." 



11 For I know Whom I have believed, and am persuaded that He is 
able to keep that which I have committed unto Him against that day." 

—II. Timothy, 1 : 12. 

A long time I have heard of Jesus Christ : the Saviour of sin- 
ners; the Son of God ; the Son of Mary ; God over all, blessed for 
evermore. Indeed, I can not indicate the hour when His name 
first hailed my ear, or His personality first impressed my mind. 

I was born in a country which, with all its shortcomings, is 
a Christian country. The aroma of Christ's character is in its air. 
The force of Christ's righteousness is in its life. The hand of 
Christ's providence has hewn its history. The power of Christ's 
spirit has inspired its religion. The teaching of Christ's word has 
shaped its legislation. Verily, exceeding great is the excellence 
of the country favored with the knowledge of the I^ord ! 

I was born, too, in a home over which hung the star of Beth- 
lehem. Father was a minister of the glorious Gospel of Imman- 
uel. Mother was a confiding, earnest, loving worshipper of the 
Prince of Peace. Our family altar was fragrant with praise and 
prayer. Our friends and visitors were men and women who had 
been at Calvary, and were on their way to Paradise regained. 
Verily, surpassing is the glory of that home which is covered with 
the cloud and smoke by day, and with the shining of the flaming 
fire by night ! 

L,ed by parental counsel and example, from my earliest child- 
hood, I breathed in the culture of the class-room ; caught the 
experiences of the prayer-meeting ; imbibed the inspirations and 
instructions of the Sabbath-school ; and twice every Sabbath sat 
listening to sermons telling the tidings of Redemption. 

" The music on my heart I bore, 
Long after it was heard no more." 

O, I am so grateful that I was not brought up beneath the 
branches of the Upas-tree of Atheism ; that I was not reared 

8 



within ths shadows of Paganism ; and that my infant intellect 
was not left an empty tablet for doubt and sin to make the first 
impression on its receptive pages ! Oh, I am so thankful that, 
from a child, I have known the Holy Scriptures which are able to 
make wise unto salvation, through faith which is in Christ Jesus ; 
and that, from my youth, the Holy Spirit lias plied me with 
reclaiming and restraining influences ! 

" Our children thou dost claim, 

O, I,ord our God, as Thine : 
Ten thousand blessings to Thy name 

For goodness so Divine." 

Absorbing the conception of Jesus Christ from the very 
atmosphere about me, I came to believe in Him. I came to 
believe in Him as God ; believe in Him as God manifest in man, 
by the oblation of Himself, making possible the reconciliation of 
God and man, and the restoration of man to the favor and image 
of God ; believe in Him as proclaiming the conditions of the pos- 
sible reconciliation and restoration ; and believe in Him as re- 
quiring submission to these conditions, and, on this submission, 
renewiog men into the sons of God, with all the felicities and im- 
munities of the precious relation — a relation demanding confiding 
and loving fealty to Himself; and insuring to those who enter into 
it happiness in this life, and immortality in the life to come. 

Analyzing my mental process to this belief, I find that it was 
the same as that by w T hich I came to believe in any person of 
whom I had previously been ignorant. I heard of him from 
others — they who knew Him commending Him to my homage, 
and seeking to impress me with a conviction of His charms and 
claims. 

So, by force of my circumstances, largely at least independ- 
ently of my own effort or volition, I came to believe in Jesus 
Christ — conceding His being ; entertaining some Scriptural con- 
ception of His character and desert ; and revering Him as the 
Great Benefactor of humanity, and as of imperative necessity, and 
of priceless value, to the world. 

9 



" Majestic sweetneet sits enthroned 

Upon the Saviour's brow : 
His head with radiant glories crowned, 

His lips with grace o'erflow." 

Believing thus in Jesus Christ, through the influence and 
teachings of others, at last I met Him directly. Although neither 
disbelieving nor ignoring nor rejecting Him, I had not embraced 
Him as my L,ord and Saviour, nor given myself into His keeping, 
nor put on His righteousness, nor surrendered myself to His use. 
I had not been delivered from condemnation, nor renewed in the 
spirit of my mind, nor transformed into an heir of the inheritance 
of the saints in light. I was an alien from the commonwealth of 
Israel, and a stranger from the covenant of promise, having no 
hope, and without God in the world. But one day a new con- 
viction arrested me, a new light encircled me, a new necessity 
grasped me, a new possibility mastered me, and a new resolution 
stirred me. I beheld myself a sinner before God. I felt myself 
obnoxious to His wrath. I realized my self- inadequacy to self- 
deliverance and improvement. I sighed for relief and satisfaction. 
I sobbed out, " O, wretched man that I am, who shall deliver me 
from this body of death ? ' ' Forthwith Another was with me — His 
bearing that of a Prince ; His face of surpassing loveliness ; and 
His lips fragrant with unutterable tenderness. Addressing me, 
He said, ' ' I am Jesus. I am the Lamb of God Who taketh away 
the sin of the world. I tasted death for every man. I am able 
to save to the uttermost. I will in no wise cast him out that 
cometh unto Me." Drawing closer, He said, "Come unto Me, 
thou heavy-laden child. In keeping of My commandments there 
is great reward. My grace shall be sufficient for thee. My God 
will supply all your need, according to His riches in glory, by 
Christ Jesus. Whom I love, I love to the end." 

11 Lift up tby streaming eyes to heaven : 

The great atonement see ; 
And all thy sins shall be forgiven— 

Believe, and thou art free." 

Believing hitherto in Jesus Christ, on the faith of others, I 

10 



now believed Him. Accepting the testimony of those in whom I 
confided, I had a favorable estimate of Him. I judged Him to 
be full of goodness and truth. I regarded Him as the Messiah 
which was to come, and Whose coming was to be for humanity 
life from the dead, and Whose law was to be the rule of all human 
action and will. But, as I now stood before Him, He filled my 
eyes and fixed my heart as never before. My faith was con- 
strained. I could not doubt Him. I felt He could not be false 
or insufficient. I felt He must be God in Christ reconciling the 
world unto Himself. I gave myself into His captivating hands ; 
realized that He gave Himself to me ; and said to those who had 
told me of Him, "Now I believe, not because of your saying ; 
for I have heard Him myself, and know that this is indeed the 
Christ, the Saviour of the world." 

It is better felt than told ; but, as far as my language can de- 
scribe the way by which my faith laid hold of Him, and my soul 
rested in His peace, I cried : " Surely, Thou art all I have heard 
of Thee : Thou art the fairest of all the children of men ; Thou 
art Jesus, for Thou shalt save Thy people from their sins. Surely, 
Thou art mighty to save : Thou art He of Whom it is written, 
It is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ 
Jesus came into the world to save sinners. Thou hast been de- 
livered for my offenses, and raised for my justification. Surely, 
Thou art able to save unto the uttermost all that come unto Thee. 
Thou art able to save me. To Thee I give myself, hungry for 
Thy salvation, and submitting myself to Thy will — I have no 
other dower : I give myself to thee. Surely, Thou dost save me ! 
I have no condemnation. I am a new creation. Old things have 
passed away. Thou art my Lord, and my God ! Surely, mine 
eyes behold Thy salvation. Thou hast forgiven my iniquity, and 
healed my sickness, and led me home from exile, and sent forth 
Thy Spirit into my heart, crying, Abba, Father ! And, ' O Lord, 
I will praise Thee : though Thou wast angry with me, Thine anger 
is taken away, and Thou comforted me. ' 



11 



" ' O happy day, that fixed my choice, 

On Thee, my Saviour, and my God ; 
Well may this glowing heart rejoice, 

And tell its rapture all abroad.' " 

Believing Jesus Christ unto my salvation, I have come to 
know Him. And not merely by name ; for I thus know many of 
whom I have no fuller knowledge. And not merely by sight — 
in form or history or land ; for I thus know many who have no 
knowledge of me. But I know Him in my heart, the hope of 
glory : my shield, and my exceeding great reward — being to me 
all I anticipated, and doing for me all He had promised. Not one 
thing hath failed of all the good things He spake concerning me : 
they are all come to pass ; and they establish my faith that no 
good thing will he withhold if I cleave to Him with full purpose 
of heart. He assuring me that, if I would confess and forsake my 
sins, I would find Him faithful and just to forgive my sins, and 
to cleanse me from all unrighteousness, lo ! in Him I have no con- 
demnation. He assuring me that, if I would follow His bidding, 
He would cast out the old man, and develop the new man, lo ! in 
Him I am a new creature. He assuring me that, if I would give 
myself up to His disposal, He would impart the estate and immu- 
nities of adoption, lo ! in Him I am a Son of God — the ring of 
sonship on my finger, the robe of sonship on my shoulder, and 
the spirit of sonship in my soul. Assuring me that, if I would 
renounce the devil, the flesh and the world, He would invest me 
with heirship to " an inheritance incorruptible, undefiled, and that 
fadeth not away," lo ! in Him " I know that if my earthly house 
of this tabernacle were dissolved, I have a building of God, an 
house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens." 

The more fully I have believed in Him, the more fully I have 
known Him. Since my first acquaintance with Him, in that day 
when I committed myself to His keeping, I have come to be more 
intimately acquainted with Him. Frequently putting Him to 
additional tests, I have frequently entered into additional experi- 
ences of His sufficiency and worthiness. Grieving His goodness 
ten thousand times, ten thousand times I have seen His goodness. 

12 



Many a time sinning against Him, many a time has He pardoned 
my sin and restored me unto the joy of His salvation. Often 
sorely tempted, often has He made me to maintain my ground, and 
opened a way for my escape. Surrounded with enemies, He has 
lifted up a standard against them, and never left me to fight them 
alone and single-handed. Shut in with shadows, He has scattered 
the darkness with a great light. Standing at the grave until it 
covers from my eyes the most of those forms whose sight has been 
my earthly ravishment, He has transformed my mourning into 
song with His word, "lam the Resurrection and the Life." 

Yes, I know whom I have believed. I know He can be 
believed. I know He has won the right to be believed. 

" Jesus, my God, I know His Name : 

His name is all my trust ; 
Nor will He put my soul to shame, 

Nor let my hope be lost." 

Knowing whom I have believed, I am persuaded that He is 
able to keep that which I have committed unto Him against that 
day. And this deposit is myself : my body, soul and substance ; 
my character, family and work ; my past, present and future ; all 
I am, and all I have, and all I hope. And that day is the day of 
the second coming of the Son of God — the day when Divinity 
shall hold its final inquest on humanity ; the day when the Lord 
Jesus Christ shall be "revealed from Heaven, with His mighty 
angels, ' ' to dismiss the impenitent from His presence forever, and 
to glorify the saintly with the glory given Him of His Father; the 
day when all the inequalities of Probation shall be set right by the 
allotments of Retribution ; the day when Time shall surrender its 
assets, and " The Eternal " shall be all in all. 

And to that august and solemn day I look forward with good 
hope. I am ignorant, and infirm, and poor, and prone to wander, 
and surrounded with enemies. In me there is no good thing. 
But " He that is for me is more than all that can be against me." 
"Who shall lay anything to the charge of God's elect ? " 

Between that day and this, much may befall me of forbidding 

13 



aspect. Friends may come to be unfriendly. Frowning foes may 
hurl at me their fiercest darts. I^oved ones may be hurried from 
my embrace by the grim monster who one day shatters all mortal 
houses. My path may lie for long years through rugged regions. 
And my soul and body will have to part company. 

But " my times are in His hand." " He knoweth the way 
that I take." " He that spared not His own Son, but delivered 
Him for us all, how shall He not with Him freely give us all 
things? " "If when we were enemies we were reconciled unto 
God, by the death of His Son, much more, being reconciled, we 
shall be saved by His life." " The name of the Lord is a strong 
tower : the righteous runneth into it, and is safe." 

Here is the anchor which holds. Here is the infrangible logic. 
There is not a loose or uncertain link in all the chain which fastens 
the saint to his Saviour. ' ' Nothing shall separate us from the 
love of Christ — neither tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or 
famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword ; for, in all these things, 
we are more than conquerors through Him that loved us. ' ' 

Then, blow on, ye blasts ; burn on, ye fires ; gather on, ye 
clouds ; roll on, ye waves ; shoot on, ye foes ! My deposit is secure. 
It can be neither captured, lost nor stolen. In " that day " I shall 
have it back, an hundred-fold enlarged : " for I am persuaded that 
neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, 
nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor 
any other creature, shall be able to separate me from the love of 
God, which is in Christ Jesus." 

" Firm as His throne His promise stands ; 

And He can well secure 
What I've committed to His hands, 

'Till the decisive hour." 

And I am not the only or principal witness to the integrity of 
Him I have believed, and to the safety of the trust committed to 
His keeping. Back in the distant centuries lived a man of imperial 
intellect, large culture, and splendid fortune. Frequent trial had 
he made of other depositories ; and he finally made up his mind 

14 



that none of them was secure enough for such a deposit as himself. 
Going one day to Damascus, he fell in with Jesus Christ, and felt 
that he could trust Him, and gave all he had into His keeping. 
And years passed. Crisis after crisis had come ; panic after panic 
had dropped its shadow ; and his Banker had never dishonored a 
draft. He had proven His capacity and fidelity in many a strain ; 
and he went up and down the earth crying, ' ' I know Whom I 
have believed, and am persuaded that He is able to keep that 
which I have committed unto Him against that day.'' 

And this deposition of the illustrious Paul is the deposition of 
the universal Church of Jesus Christ. Not one confiding in Him 
has been left desolate. Shall I ring a bell, whose tones, pealing 
along the ages behind us, shall bring into court the saints of every 
clime and generation ? Shall I move my wand over the avenues 
of the past, and call in all who have ever accepted and loved and 
trusted the Son of Man ? Behold ! here they are : from the company 
of the patriarchs and of the prophets ; from the company of the 
disciples and of the martyrs ; from the company of our fathers and 
mothers and of those with whom we have often taken counsel 
together. — 

" Today they come transfigured back, 

I see them marshalled in a shining row 
Of ever-youthful forms, that fairer show 

Secttre from harm in their high-hearted ways- 
Beautiful evermore, and with the rays 

On their white shields of expectation." 

Beautiful, resplendent throng ! Make room for them ! Stand 
while they seat themselves ! 

" Oh, what a glorious company, 
As saints and angels join." 

Christian courtesy demands that our celestial guests shall 
have the floor. 

Brothers and sisters from the Church of ' ' The First-born ' ' 
before the throne, we wait your testimony ! 

Brothers and sisters of the Church of " The First-born " in 
the wilderness, I introduce Moses declaring : " The Eternal God 

15 



is my refuge, and underneath me are the Everlasting Arms. ' ' 

And Joshua : " As for me, and my house, we will serve the 

Lord." 

And Ruth : " Thy people shall be my people, and Thy God 

shall be my God." 

And Hannah : ' ' He will keep the feet of His saints. ' ' 

And Nehemiah : " The God of Heaven, He will prosper us.' ' 

And Elijah : " The God that answereth by fire, let him be 

God." 

And Elisha : ' ' They that be with us are more than they that 

be with them." 

And Job : " I know that my Redeemer liveth." 

And David : " Thou wilt show me the path of life." 

And Solomon : ' ' Her ways are ways of pleasantness. ' ' 

And Isaiah : "O Lord, I will praise Thee." 

And Jeremiah : " The Lord is the portion of my soul." 

And Ezekiel : ' ' The earth shined with His glory. ' ' 

And Daniel : " My God has sent His angel, and shut the 

lion's mouth, that he hath not hurt me." 

And Zechariah : " At evening time it shall be light." 

And Habakkuk : " I will rejoice in the Lord, and joy in the 

God of my salvation." 

And Mary : " My soul doth magnify the Lord. " 

And Thomas : " My Lord, and my God." 

And Peter and John, both speaking at once : "We cannot 

but speak the things which we have seen and heard." 

And Stephen : "I see the heavens opened, and the Son of 

Man standing on the right hand of God. ' ' 

And James : " Blessed is the man that endureth temptation." 
And Polycarp : " He never said an unkind word to me. " 
And Luther : ' ' Our God is the God from whence cometh sal- 
vation." 

And Knox : "Live in Christ, and the flesh shall not fear 

death." 

And Calvin : "lam abundantly satisfied. ' ' 

16 



And Wesley : ' ' The best of all is, God is with us. " 
And Bunsen : ' ' My richest experience is having known 
Jesus Christ." 

And Bishop Janes : "I am not disappointed. ' ' 
And Faber : — 

"If our love were but more simple, 

We should take Hirn at His word ; 
And our lives would be all sunshiae 

In the sweetness of our I«ord." 

Many others are ready to declare that, through ' ' fightings 
without and fears within," " they overcame by the blood of the 
Lamb, and by the word of their testimony ; and they loved not 
their lives unto the death. ' ' But the time is up ; and I must ad- 
journ this love-feast. Before we dismiss, however, let us join our 
saintly visitors in singing, "Unto Him that loved us, and washed 
us from our sins in His own blood, and hath made us kings and 
priests unto God and His Father ; to Him be glory and dominion 
forever and ever. Amen. ' ' 

Ye who have made no deposit with Christ, make such deposit 
now. Open an account with Him. Every other depository is 
insecure ; every other vault can be rifled. There is nothing true 
but Heaven. There is salvation only in the ' ' Lamb of God Who 
taketh away the sin of the world." 

Ye who believe in Christ, and know Whom you have be- 
lieved, open your lips in His honor. Commend His grace ; show 
forth His goodness and truth ; tell all you know about Him. We 
owe this to Him, that He may enlarge the circle of His deposi- 
tors ; and that His ' ' Word may have free course, and be glorified, 
even as it is with you." We owe it to our fellowmen, that they 
may find the best securities, and know with Whom they may 
most safely invest the keeping of themselves. We owe it to our- 
selves, that we may assure ourselves that we are still dealing with 
the Banker Who never breaks up or suspends ; that we may draw 
others to the same celestial counter, and thus enlarge its capital, — 
and thus increase the dividend due us when interest day arrives, 

17 



and the hopes of earth are cashed in the currency of Heaven. 



" Jesus, to Thee I now can fly, 

On Whom my help is laid : 
Oppressed with sin, I lift mine eye, 

And see the shadows fade. 
Believing on my Lord, I find 

A sure and present aid : 
On Thee alone my constant mind 

Be every moment stayed." 



18 



"And God said unto Moses, I AM THAT I AM."— Exodus, 3 : 14. 

A name is a sign of personality : a verbal designation by 
which one human being is known from and to another. Desiring 
acquaintance with one with whom I have not had previous ac- 
quaintance, I give him my name and request his, and our ac- 
quaintance is begun. Introducing two strangers to each other, I 
pronounce their names ; and at once there is a basis between them 
for present communion, and for subsequent intercourse. Present- 
ing myself, as the representative of my government to another, 
the name of mine opens the way for my entrance, and for the 
prosecution of my mission. 

Karly in the annals of the human race, the race falls into 
apostasy, and is overtaken with all the penalties of lapse from its 
original rectitude. A shepherd is one day superintending his 
flock on the edge of a desert ; and suddenly a bush, all aflame, 
hails his eye. As he gazes curiously, the bush burns steadily on, 
but is unconsumed. Desirous of full knowledge of so peculiar a 
phenomenon, his advancing footsteps are arrested by a voice from 
within the glowing shrub, advising him that he is nearing hal- 
lowed ground; commanding him to becoming demeanor; dele- 
gating him to lead his oppressed people out of its servitude and 
suffering ; promising to be his direction and sufficiency ; and pro- 
nouncing the name of the speaker, I Am That I Am, as his 
own guarantee and inspiration, and as the potent wand in whose 
presence all doubt shall disappear, all opposition give way, and all 
rebellion subside. 

Clearly, I Am That I Am is a term of kindred origin and 
significance with the term Jehovah, or Eh-yeh ; but it is in this 
connection said to be a previously unknown designation of the 
Supreme Being. And He Himself, in the sixth chapter of this 
same book of Exodus, says, ' ' By My name Jehovah was I not 
known to Abraham and Isaac and Jacob/' Nevertheless, He is 
called Jehovah before this in the records of this same writer, 

19 



Moses. And in the records of this writer, are reports of the 
patriarchs employing this hallowed address in their suits at the 
throne of God. In solution of the apparent contradiction, it is 
suggested that the Ineffable Name is here actually assumed by the 
L,ord of all for the first time in His communications to the chil- 
dren of men ; and that Moses is so deeply and indelibly impressed 
with the wondrous epiphany, that when afterward referring to the 
Deity in connection with anterior events, he almost unconsciously 
employs the teeming name he has learned from out of the burn- 
ing bush. And it is plausible and possible ; for God says to Noah, 
11 I do set My bow in the cloud," as if at that moment casting the 
brilliant arch across the sky: though in fact the bow had been 
hung in the cloud centuries before Noah was born. Noting the 
birth of your child in the family record, you enter his name along 
with the date of his birth, though the name may not have been 
given him until months after his birth. So, I Am That I Am, or 
Jehovah, when it first fell upon his ear, may have so stirred the 
writer of the Pentateuch that it rushes intuitively to his lips when 
speaking of the High and Lofty one — even when speaking of Him 
with reference to prior acts and appearances. 

It is a different solution, however, to which I most incline : 
believing that the august name is not here first spoken in human 
ear, but that it is here delegated to henceforth carry new concep- 
tions of God to the human mind, and to suggest new experiences 
and potencies to the human soul. As the bow in the cloud is to 
be assigned to a new use, the token of a particular covenant of 
God with man ; and as the child, hitherto known as baby, or dar- 
ling, or pet, is to be known hereafter by a distinguishing surname ; 
so God, hitherto called Elohim — "The Eternal Powers," — is to be 
called I Am That I Am — "lam the constant and exhaustless 
and timely sufficiency of My chosen people." 

Moses, bear in mind, is just Divinely-commissioned to be the 
leader of a people Divinely-elected to be conformed to the Divine 
will and to enjoy the Divine favor, and to be the means of the up- 
lifting of entire humanity into the same beatific estate. But he dis- 

20 



cerns in front of him clustering difficulties — the distrust and 
ignorance and murmuring of his own charge, the enmity of other 
nations, and the tribulations of the way ; and God, for his own 
animation, and for the encouragement of his charge, in every sub- 
sequent trial, says, I Am That I Am — I am not a far-away or 
helpless or indifferent Being : I am all in all, always with you, 
always concerned for you, always mighty to bring you off more 
than conqueror. Dismiss your fears ; forward, march ! 

Now, crossing the intervening centuries, gazing upon the 
radiant shrub of Horeb, and standing by the side of the Hebrew 
shepherd, our ears also hear God say, I Am That I Am ; and we 
pause to ponder the significance of the thrilling syllables. 

I Am a Being. I am not a mere concept of the judgment, 
or impression of the imagination, or reminiscence of the memory. 
I am not simply a dream born of broken slumber, or an invention 
hewn from the head of genius, or a myth mysteriously launched 
upon the flood of years. I am a Being. In Me inhere all the 
attributes and essentials of being : all its completeness and iden- 
tity and separateness — all that distinguishes entity from non- 
entity. 

I am as really as thou art. Thine eye discerns this ruddy 
flame and sparkling shrub. Thine ears hear the voice within 
them. Thy foot presses the ground which is the scene of the 
marvellous manifestation of this hour. And thy senses assure 
thee that each is in distinction from the other, and that thou art 
other than they. And, though not as palpable to thy senses, I 
am as fully and verily as they or thou. 

I am not such a being as thou : fallen, fallible, finite ; but I 
am as actual and complete a being as thou art. My fashion of 
being is not such as thine ; but I am as genuinely and thoroughly 
as thou art. 

" t,ord of all being ! throned afar, 

Thy glory flames from sun and star : 
Center and Soul of every sphere, 

To every loving heart how dear ! " 

I Am a Personal Being. Affirming that the all is God, 

21 



Pantheism insists that I am merely a name for the varied forces 
and laws which animate and control the universe — that I am 
merely the sum of all that is. And the universe is the creature 
of My hand, and the subject of My sovereignty. I am its origin 
and its sustentation. My breath was its birth ; my inspiration is 
its continuance ; and my withdrawal would be its destruction. 
But I am not the universe, and the universe is not Me. The book 
is not the author, nor the engine its engineer, nor the house its 
maker. The former, in either instance, is not the latter ; and, 
in either instance, the latter may be without the former. I am 
equally distinct from my handiwork and processes, and equally 
distinguishable from them. I and mine are just as capable of 
severance, in both fact and thought, as thou and thine. In arrest 
of man's arrogance, I sometimes forbid him to think of Me as one 
like unto himself; but I now lay no such interdict. In this in- 
stance he has full warrant to measure Me by himself. In the 
matter of personality, I am as he is. I am an individual. I am 
a single essence. I am One. I am One as actually and compre- 
hensively and exclusively and inclusively and solely as the angel 
I delegate to keep thee in all thy ways ; and as thy brother Aaron 
whom I have designated to be thy mouth unto the children of 
Israel ; and as thy sister Miriam whom I have elected to lift her 
timbrel at the head of the ransomed on the farther shore of the 
Red Sea. 

" Cod is the name my soul adores, 

The Almighty Three, the Eternal One : 
Nature and grace, with all their powers, 

Confess the Infinite Unknown." 

I Am the Supreme Being. According to Dualism, two 
deities parcel out between them the conservation and oversight of 
the affairs and destinies of all existences. And Polytheism pro- 
claims a herd of divinities, of every caliber and grade and sex, and 
teaches that in this motley rabble is the beginning and consumma- 
tion of all things. And, on either conjecture, it is no marvel that 
confusion runs riot, religion is an object of contempt, and worship 
is an unmeaning mockery . 

22 



But I have neither equal nor like. No partner divides with 
Me the authorship or management of the universe. No rival can 
defeat My decrees or gather in My revenues. I am God, and be- 
side Me there is no other. I am the High and Lofty One, Who 
inhabiteth eternity. My kingdom ruleth over all. Worship the 
Lord in the beauty of holiness ! 

'■ Before Jehovah's awful throne, 

Ye nations bow with sacred joy. 
Know that the Lord is God alone ; 

He can create, and He destroy." 

I Am That I Am. All other beings are because I have 
caused them to be, and are affected greatly by their antecedents, 
or fashioned largely by their circumstances. None of them is en- 
tirely either the cause or the condition of himself. But I had no 
beginning. I owe nothing to antecedents or circumstances. Ex- 
ternals work no impression into My essence. I am both the 
spring and the stream of Myself. Before the mountains were 
brought forth, or ever I had formed the earth and the world, even 
from everlasting to everlasting I am God. 

All other beings are changeable ; for once they were not, and 
they are what they were not, and they will be what they are not. 
But I am immutable : the Father of lights, with Whom can be no 
variation — the same yesterday, today, and for ever. 

All other beings are confronted with impassable barriers. 
Around them are boundaries which allow no crossing. Although 
manifold emergencies or opportunities may call them to new lines 
of action and enjoyment, and suggest new aspirations and attain- 
ments, still stern limitations bar their path. But I am no help- 
less accident of the past, or dream of the present, or possibility of 
the future. No Alps are in My way. Existing of Myself, and 
sufficient to Myself, I am full of potencies : My own volition is My 
only law, and My only measure. I Am What I Am ; and, with- 
out alteration in either constitution or qualit}', will be what I will 
to be : for with me one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand 
years as one day. Today I blaze as the burning bush ; tomor- 
row I will flame as the Shekinah ; then in the wilderness I will 

23 



gleam as the Pillar of fire ; and then in later ages I will incarnate 
Myself in human form, and walk the earth as the Son of Man ; 
and then, shortly after, I will meet the Christian Church in an 
upper room in Jerusalem, and shine on its every head as the 
Tongue of Fire, and set it, collectively and individually, stirring 
with the Holy Ghost. 

All other beings are comprehensible by their fellow-beings. 
In them are no depths beyond exploration. You can easily 
fathom and weigh them. You can readily read them through and 
through. But I am beyond complete analysis and understanding. 
I am beyond the loftiest finite flight. Glimpses of My nature and 
ways may be caught by common intelligence. Grander glimpses 
may flash upon the perception of the pure in heart. Sublimer 
glimpses will hail the vision of the ransomed when they shall see 
the King in His beauty in the land which is very far off. Never- 
theless, I am a God Who hideth Himself. I dwell in a light 
which no man can approach unto. There is a ne plus ultra in the 
w r ay of all finite canvass. Canst thou by searching find out God ? 
Canst thou find out the Almighty to perfection ? 

All other beings have names which adequately and always 
describe them. One term fully distinguishes them from all their 
associates. One word sufficiently identifies them in all the places, 
and through all the periods of their history. But, God over all, 
as I am, I can make no one name in the language of humanity 
accurately and unvaryingly do service as my description or expo- 
nent. No one name is elastic enough and large enough to set Me 
forth. The best I can do is to select several of the broadest and 
deepest words men ever use, in the expression of their concep- 
tions of the character and duration and modes of being, and say 
I Am That I Am. 

" Cotne, O my soul, iti sacred lays, 

Attempt thy great Creator's praise ; 
But O. what tongue can speak His fame ? 

What mortal verse can reach the theme ? 
Raised on devotiou*s loftiest wing. 

Do thou, my soul. His glories sing ; 
And let His oraise employ thy tongue, 

Till listening worlds shall join the song," 

24 



I Am Always That Which I Am. A new departure is being 
undertaken by the ancient Church. It is entering into new con- 
ditions and experiences ; and God, in the assumption of this 
designation, assures that Church that its new crisis has not 
caught Him by surprise, or nonplussed His capacity, but that He 
is in every way equal to the emergency without delay and with- 
out uncertainty ; and through it assures the Church that in all 
coming crises, through all the eternities, He is abreast of its 
emergencies, close at hand, and ready and sufficient for all its 
desires and oppositions and perplexities — a present help in its 
every time of trial or of wish. It is an announcement to all the 
generations of those who stay themselves upon His name, that 
He lives in all periods and places — past, present and future ; and 
in all periods and places at once, and fully, and potentially. It is 
His solemn and unqualified averment, I not merely was, or will 
be, but I Am. I have not outlived Myself ; I have not yet to 
possess Myself of being or force ; but I Am. It may be neces- 
sary, because of the poverty of human speech, for humanrty to 
speak of Me in connection with yesterday or today or tomorrow ; 
but in truth I have neither yesterday nor today nor tomorrow ; 
but I Am. It is alwa)^s now with Me. Shut in with essential 
limitations, My people will ever be liable to fortunes in the pres- 
ence of which they are helpless ; but I, knowing no limitations, 
am ever their provision and refuge and triumph. 

And, therefore, the name b} r which I now disclose Myself is 
no arbitrary or heartless or meaningless announcement of cold and 
distant sovereignty. It is not given to awe thee into alarm, or to 
send thee into remote retreats, as I royally go passing by. It is a 
loving expression of my constant and particular interest in My 
elect — a revelation that, as the father, who is all he ought to be to 
his children and their mother, is trul}' said to live for them, I live 
for those who commit themselves to My keeping in well-doing. 
My eyes go to and fro throughout the w T hole earth, to show Myself 
strong in the behalf of them whose heart is perfect towards Me. 
No good thing will I withhold from them who walk uprightl}'. 

25 



Indeed, the very mystery of the name I assume is one of My 
most signal mercies to the Church which I elect as a peculiar 
treasure to Myself. Any other name might insinuate limitations 
either in My care or in My power or in My will ; for, calling My- 
self Bread, it would be enough when My children are hungry, but 
what would they do when in need of clothing ? or Friend, it would 
be enough when they are forsaken and lonely, but what would 
they do when in need of a Saviour ? or Home, it would be enough 
when they are without a place to lay their heads, but what would 
they do when, about to go the way of all the earth, they are in 
need of Heaven ? 

It is I Am That I Am, therefore, which I call Myself — I Am 
All and in All. Ask what you choose, and I am your answer. I 
am the Father of lights : call on Me, and I am your desire. I am 
the Fount of every blessing : draw on Me, and I am your ful- 
ness. I am the God of all grace : look to Me, and I am your 
satisfaction. I am able to do exceeding abundantly above all that 
you can ask or think : make out your draft for whatever you need 
for life or for godliness, and I am both your security and your 
sufficiency. 

If you are a criminal, I am forgiveness ; or foul, I am cleans- 
ing ; or worldly, I am sanctification. If you are forsaken, I am 
your company ; or an orphan, I am your father ; or a widow, I 
am your husband. If you are helpless, I am your strength ; or 
in sickness, I am your health ; or in war, I am your shield. If 
you are dying, I am your life ; or dead, I am your resurrection ; 
or houseless, I am your house not made with hands, eternal in the 
heavens. There is nothing I am not to those who cast their care 
upon Me : I carry them on My heart ; I cover them all the day 
long ; I am their past and present and future ; I am their today 
and tomorrow and their world without end ; I am their earth and 
their heaven ; I am theirs for better and for worse ; and they shall 
be Mine when I make up My jewels. 



26 



"This God is the God we adore, 

Our faithful, unchangeable Friend. 
Whose love is as great as His power, 

And neither knows measure nor end. 
'Tis Jesus, the First and the I^ast, 

Whose Spirit shall guide us safe home ; 
We'll praise Him for all that is past, 

And trust Him for all that's to come." 

I Am That I Am. Excellent Name ! It brings the Su- 
preme Being out of the sublime and unapproachable immensity 
within the horizon of humanity ; calls us in to His immediate 
presence ; and proclaims that He is a God close at hand, and not 
afar off, and that in Him all fulness dwells. 

I Am That I Am. Fragrant Name ! It is the charter of all 
the blessings of the saints : their refuge and rest amid all their 
anxieties and toils : their satisfaction and sufficiency throughout 
all ages and conditions. It is the Name which is above every 
name ; for if it were not, it might some day be less than we need : 
we might some day have to go elsewhere for supplies, or go tin- 
supplied. This Name, however, is a name of limitless compass 
and efficiency — broader, deeper, fuller, higher and sweeter than all 
hesides — and secures to us all that we can ask or think, for ever 
and for ever, here and hereafter. 

I Am That I Am. Immortal Name ! Many other names 
have been to me comfort and stay: their mention came like music 
to my ear, and like sunshine to my soul. They, alas, long since 
are only memories of departed, or prophecies of coming, joys ; but 
His Name is a deathless name, a living name, a potent name. It 
bows all the ages, fills all the cycles, governs all the empires, 
rules all the eternities, and sways all the infinities. 

I Am That I Am. Incomparable Name ! He who thus 
designates Himself is the Lord of all ; but He calls to us out of 
the burning bush, as we wander in the desert, and seeks our ac- 
quaintance. He has no need of closer relations with us. He is 
constrained by no personal necessity for our society. He is im- 
pelled by neither lack nor solitude to crave our company. We 
can add nothing to His essential completeness of character or cir- 



cumstance. He is already God over all, blessed for ever more : 
celestial orders bend about him ; cherubim and seraphim lay their 
adoration at His feet. He, however, covets communion and 
dwelling with us for our sake. He gives us His Name that it may 
be to us an inspiration within and a shield without ; that at its 
mention bondage may open its doors for our exodus, the sea part 
for our passage, and the wilderness spring into flowers as we 
thread its depths ; and that at its sound the burdens of life may 
drop from our shoulders, death grow bright with angelic minis- 
tries, and heavenly portals swing back to let us in. 

I Am That I Am. Matchless grace ! Wonderful words of 
light ! Hector is again going forth to the defense of his beloved 
Tro3 T , and expands his arm to clasp his little son in a fond, last 
embrace ; but the child shrinks crying back to the bosom of his 
mother, 

" Scared to see 
His father helmeted in glittering brass, 
And eying with affright the horse-hair 
That grimly nodded from the lofty crest." 

And the father lays aside his armor, and the child leaps delighted 
to his breast. Hitherto only dimly disclosed to human intelli- 
gence, kept away by human undeserving, but longing for reunion 
with His prodigal children, God comes out of His distance, de- 
scends to their low estate, lays aside His appalling majesty, re- 
veals Himself in a gentler habit and b} r a sweeter name — I Am 
That I Am, and seeks their love and trust. 



28 



III. 

"Before Abraham was, I am."— John, 8 :58. 

Early in the morning, in the Temple at Jerusalem, one day 
nearry two thousand years ago, a young man about thirty years 
of age has declared the forgiveness of a sinful woman arraigned 
before Him for condemnation, and proclaims that in Him, as the 
Light of the world, all who follow Him shall have forgiveness 
and walk in the light of life. 

For some time He has been assuming such prerogatives and 
making such promises, and professing the establishment of these 
prerogatives and promises by various arguments and works. His 
claims are evidently claims to be more in dominion and nature than 
man has ever been seen to be — even to be akin in dominion and 
nature to Him Who sits at the fount of all being and government, 
God over all, blessed and supreme for ever more. It is blasphemy 
in the judgment of those who are at the front in the Church of 
the period — a Church conceded by Himself to be of Divine begin- 
ning and history and ritual ; and certain of its magnates join 
issue with Him against His declarations and pretensions. Main- 
taining His declarations and pretensions, He affirms, as the end of 
all controversy, "If a man keep My sayings, he shall never see 
death. •' Matchless audacity, summit of presumption, in Pharisaic 
estimation ; and the estimation expresses itself in the reply, 
" Now, we know that Thou hast a devil : Abraham is dead, and 
the prophets ; and Thou say est, If a man keep My saying, he 
shall never taste of death. ' ' The climax is reached as He avers, 
God is My Father. Your father Abraham had foresight of My 
day, and hailed its dawn, and by faith walked in its light ; for, 
though I have been known to you only about thirty years, 
" Before Abraham was, I am." It is the language of Christ. 

He is evidently man — a man as fully and really as any of us : 
a man in body, and heart, and intellect, and necessity, and per- 
formance ; a man of the highest style of manhood. He is no 
inferior specimen of our race. None, among all the sons of men, 

29 



has ever been beyond Him in character or influence or possibility. 
He is the ideal man. Imagination has never fashioned the con- 
ception of a better. Judgment pronounces Him the perfection of 
perfection. Love recommends Him to its darlings as the noblest 
of all models for their imitation. 

He is, in evangelical circles, admitted to be God. It is 
admitted that manhood, even in its unfallen conditions, cannot 
approximate His height. It is admitted that such a man as He 
is must be more than man. It is admitted that He is so much 
more than man that He cannot be less than God— that He is God 
in all the excellence of His being, and in all the fulness of His 
sovereignty. 

He is, notwithstanding the duality of His nature, conceded 
to be One Person. It is conceded that neither nature is absorbed 
into the other. It is conceded that the two natures do not merely 
keep house together, or lie along side of each other. It is con- 
ceded that He is One Person of Whom both Divinity and humanity, 
each in all its entirety, are essential factors — One Person in all 
the completeness and indentity and separateness of personality ; 
' ' so that two whole and perfect natures, that is to say, the God- 
head and manhood, are joined together in One Person, never to 
be divided ; whereof is one Christ." 

The incarnation (incarnation denoting the union of the God- 
head and Manhood in the One Person we call Christ) is for all the 
eternity to come. Godhead is not Christ, nor is manhood Christ ; 
but Christ is the Person constituted of both Godhead and man- 
hood : and either the one or the other abstracted, there is no more 
Christ, just as there is no more whole manhood if either body or 
soul is w T anting. It was neither Godhead nor manhood who 
achieved our redemption, and wrought out our uplifting into a 
new creation ; but Godhead and manhood joined together in the 
adorable Personality of Christ. Our faith and gratitude and love, 
as in this life we lay hold of the great redemption and uplifting, 
cry out, " Thanks be unto God for His unspeakable gift;" and, as 
we depart out of this life, shout, "Thanks be to God Who 

30 



giveth us the victory, through our Lord Jesus Christ ; " and, as 
we range the realms of the life to come, sing, "Unto Him that 
loved us, and washed us from our sins in His own blood, and hath 
made us kings and priests unto God, and His Father : to Him be 
glory and dominion for ever and ever. Amen." Verily, forever 
and ever ; for our kingship is ceased, and our priesthood is ex- 
pired, and our song is stilled, if ever Christ, Deity and humanity 
in One Person, is no more. Praises measureless as our being to 
the God of all grace, there is no such disaster ahead of the 
redeemed from among the sons of men. Their inheritance is an 
everlasting inheritance. Their Redeemer, the Divine-human 
Christ, is the Divine-human Christ "throughout all ages, world 
without end." The hope of earth, He is the joy of Heaven. 
Somewhere in immortal lands there is a country as real and sub- 
stantial as the country of Judea ; and there, on a throne as real 
and substantial as the throne of David, sits Christ, as re'al and 
substantial a Person as when He sat at the table of Martha and 
Mary ; and there, as really and substantially as when James and 
John and Peter saw Him amid the felicities and splendors of His 
Transfiguration, shall we see His face and sun ourselves in His 
smile. 

His incarnation (the embodiment of Divinity in matter) 
being a fact for the eternity to come, it is not impossible or in- 
credible that it was a fact far back in the eternity past. If God 
could create man six thousand years ago, He could create him 
twelve thousand years ago. If He could constitute an incarna- 
tion of Himself two thousand years ago, He could twenty thousand 
years ago : He could twenty millions of years ago. Nay, if His 
incarnation could be a fact in any period of the past, it could be 
from all eternity. 

If it is objected that the conception of the pre-incarnation of 
God is a humiliating conception of Deity, I answer that Divine 
embodiment in matter is no more Deity-humiliating if occurring 
in celestial regions, centuries of centuries since, than if occurring; 
in Bethlehem of Judea twenty centuries since. I answer farther, 

Ol 



that it is not so humiliating to clothe Himself in matter freshly and 
purposely called into being, as to clothe Himself in matter in the 
form of man after man has debased it for four thousand 3^ears. I 
answer, yet farther, that there is absolutely no basis for the notion 
that matter is inherently imperfect or impure. For all I know, 
or any one else knows, in itself matter is as clean and pure as 
spirit. 

If it is objected that the conception of the incarnation of God 
constitutes Him a Being of body and parts, I answer that it is an 
old man-made catechism, and not Holy Scripture, which affirms 
that He has not body and parts ; for the declaration that He is a 
11 Spirit" is not conclusive, as Spirit primaril}' signifies capacity 
for invisibility rather than immateriality. I answer farther, that 
we have no distinct and influential conception of God, except as 
we conceive of Him in some way possessed of material belongings ; 
and that even if we hold that He is bodiless, in any discussion of 
Him, we have to invest Him with form to discuss Him at all ; and 
that He, in the Book He has inspired for the revelation of Him- 
self to man whom He has made in His own likeness, has to re- 
veal Himself in the likeness of man for man to understand His 
discourse. I answer farther still, that our affirmation of Divine 
incarnation is not of all, but of one, of the Three Persons of the 
Godhead ; and it is not only an article of faith, but also a fact of 
history, that He does have a body. 

If it is objected that the conception of the incarnation of 
God in eternity past involves the admission of the eternity of 
matter, I answer, not necessarily, unless it is insisted that the in- 
carnation is from all eternity. I answer farther, though not es- 
sential to our argument, that it is only an assumption that matter 
is not from all eternity ; it is not in evidence that it is not from all 
eternity from the testimony of either reason or revelation. In it- 
self it is as probable that matter has always been, as that it has 
not. The everlasting Lord has announced no absolute dictum 
about it ; and man is not old enough to announce such dictum. 

If it is objected that the incarnation of God is merely a neces- 

32 



sity of the sin of man, I answer that this cannot be the fact ; for 
it assumes the modification of the mode of being of the immu- 
table God, not only because of man's need, but also because of 
His creature's transgression — a modification manifestly inconsistent 
with the perfection of the Creator and Governor of all being. 
He may apparently change His bearing toward His creature, as 
His creature is loyal or rebellious ; but His nature is unchange- 
able. He may, in different conditions and periods disclose differ- 
ent aspects of Himself ; but the tendency to every aspect He ever 
discloses is inherent in Him, waiting all the while His decree for 
its disclosure. He is constitutionally "the same yesterday, and 
today, and for ever ;" and it is not conceivable that the lapse of 
the human race caught him by surprise, disturbed the very foun- 
dations of His being, and necessitated a reorganization of Him- 
self to meet an unforeseen crisis in His administration. He is 
from everlasting to everlasting. 

His eternal incarnation is not, however, affirmed of the Sec- 
ond Person of the Godhead, though it is claimed it would be 
difficult to establish its impossibility ; but it is no new assumption 
that there is in Divinity an eternal tendency to incarnation. Dor- 
ner, in his " Doctrine of the Person of Christ," says, " The only 
true conception of God is one which, so far from being incompat- 
ible with, involves His being determined to an incarnation by His 
own eternal moral nature." Raymond XyUlli says, " The incar- 
nation is indeed a work of free love : we cannot say that it was 
brought about by sin, but that God owed it to himself." Ruper- 
tus says, " Men and angels were created for the sake of the one 
Man, Jesus Christ, and He did not need sin in order to become 
incarnate." Wessel says, " The final cause of the incarnation is 
not to be found in the human race, but in the Son of God Him- 
self; He became man for His own sake. He would have as- 
sumed humanity even if Adam had never sinned." While thus, 
as early as the twelfth century, it was held by some that there 
would have been a Divine incarnation even in the absence of 
human forfeiture of primeval estate and excellence, they do not 

33 



seem to have thought of the possibility of such an incarnation 
long anterior to the entrance of the human race upon the stage of 
being. Yet, if there is a constitutional tendency in God to invest 
Himself with material form, and if he would have invested Him- 
self with material form if man had maintained his original right- 
eousness, why should He have delayed until matter in man, in 
whose likeness he came, was degraded ? Is it not easier to con- 
ceive that the Son of God was embodied in matter long before 
man was created — matter itself being first created or fashioned to 
make Him a vesture ? 

His own language, " Before Abraham was, I am," now chal- 
lenges our consideration. In this declaration is the echo of His 
declaration, " I Am That I Am," made to Moses from out of the 
burning bush, hundreds of years before, in the mountain of 
Horeb. Moses asked Him for His name. Names describe char- 
acter or nature or office. And the Ineffable One answered, 
' \ Moses, the human vocabulary is so meagre that I cannot give 
you My name in any one word. I am too broad in being, I am 
too large in nature, I am too measureless in capacity and possi- 
bility, to size Myself in a single word. I will do my best to make 
Myself known to you. I will choose several of the fullest and 
most potential words of } T our dialect, and thus endeavor to lift you 
to some conception of Who I am. I Am That I Am. I Am 
Eternal, Omniscient, Omnipotent. I Am Goodness, Justice, 
Truth. I Am the Creator, the Preserver and the Sovereign of the 
universe. I Am all I ever need to be to accomplish My designs, 
to carry on My government, and to work out my will. I Am All 
In All to those who commit themselves to My keeping in well- 
doing. I am God, inhabiting eternity and infinity when as yet 
there was none beside Me. I Am the Son of God, when I ex- 
press Myself in creation. I Am the Holy Spirit, when I make 
manifestation of Myself to created spirits. I Am the Jehovah of 
the Patriarchal age, the Lord of the Judaic dispensation, the 
Christ of the redeemed from among the sons of men. From aeon 
to aeon, from century to century, from day to day, I Am the 

34 



Satisfaction and the Sufficiency of Myself, and, diverse and pecu- 
liar as their conditions and obligations and necessities, evermore 
the Satisfaction and Sufficiency of My people. In one of My 
adaptations, I appear as a descendant of your father Abraham. 
It is a new revelation to you, but no new thought in Me. Before 
Abraham I was the Son of God, and am now." But, if He was 
in being before Abraham, He was in being two thousand years 
before His being in Judea. 

It is a common opinion that it was He Who appeared to our 
father and mother in human form in Eden in its excellence, and 
walked by their side in close and visible communion. But, if He 
was in being in Eden, He was in being two thousand years be- 
fore His being in the Abrahamic period. 

It is a common opinion that it was He Who, declaring Him- 
self as Wisdom in the eighth chapter of Proverbs, declared, "I was 
set up from everlasting, from the beginning, or ever the earth was. 
When He prepared the Heavens, I was there. I was daily His 
delight, rejoicing always before Him." But, if He was in being, 
before the earth was built, before the heavens were fashioned, and 
before the worlds were hung through the waiting realms of space, 
He was in being before matter had been called into form or spirit 
was stained with sin. 

It is affirmed by some that the manifestations of Divinity in 
material garments, in Eden and elsewhere, were merely special 
material manifestations for special purposes. It is a mere assump- 
tion. It has not even a Scripture hint for its foundation. It is a 
dangerous style of Scripture interpretation. It makes Christ a 
mere creature of circumstances. It is fettered with greater diffi- 
culties than the theory of earlier incarnation, and has none of its 
probabilities. 

It is affirmed by others that, declaring, "Before Abraham was 
I Am," Christ is merely declaring the Divinity of His Person. 
But Divinity is not the Christ. Neither the body nor the soul is 
the man. Neither Divinity nor humanity is the Christ. Christ 



35 



is the union of Divinity and humanity in One Person — the ab- 
sence of either is the death of the Person. 

If Christ's own language is to be literally understood, and if 
His Church has a proper conception of the Divine appearances 
prior to His incarnation in Bethlehem, He was in being before 
He was born of Mary ; before His interview with Abram con- 
cerning the destruction of Sodom ; before His presence with 
Adam and Eve amid the bovvers of Paradise; and before the fields 
of space were sown with worlds. 

It is everywhere eternity and infinity. God is alone in being. 
He is a Triune Being, Father, Son and Holy Spirit — three Per- 
sons in one essence. He is absolutely perfect. In Him is neither 
lack nor need. He is absolutely supreme. To Him there are no 
impossibilities. To will, is to be and to do as He wills. Never- 
theless, all He wills to be and do is not yet an accomplishment. 
All His designs are not yet effected. All his potencies and ten- 
dencies are not yet wrought out. Their working out is to be the 
work of the everlasting ages. The everlasting ages are to be 
crowded with unfoldings of Himself. 

It is now His appointed epoch for the external expression of 
Himself. He has not hitherto been idle ; but His action hitherto 
has been in and on and with Himself. It has been in commun- 
ion and delight and engagement of one Divine Person with the 
others. 

He now goes without Himself, and expresses Himself in mat- 
ter. For all that Scripture affirms, matter may have been from all 
eternity waiting His will ; but on this I do not insist, as it is not 
essential to our argument. 

He fashions of it a vesture for the Second Person of Him- 
self ; and declares, " Thou art My Son : this day have I begotten 
Thee." He fashions of it for Him a throne ; and declares, "Thy 
throne, O God, is for ever and ever." And He fashions of it, 
for His court, angels ; and declares, " Let all the angels of God 
worship Him." 

He Himself thus embodied, His throne established, and His 

36 



court organized, He creates world after world ; dowers them with 
inhabitants ; furnishes them with laws, and ministries, and sup- 
plies ; and gathers constantly enlarging glory. Now, He makes 
the world. And now He makes man. 

Nor is His material vestment, nor the material vestment of 
angels, either a disparagement or a liinderance. There is no 
foundation for the notion that matter in itself is less excellent 
than spirit. For all that is revealed, matter may be essential to 
some of the operations of spirit. Matter, as is indicated in the 
movement of Moses and Elijah from Heaven to Hermon, and in 
the appearance and disappearance of Christ Himself at His 
pleasure, may be capable of such etherealization as to be no bar- 
rier to passage from place to place, or to such passage with a 
rapidity beyond all our present understanding. 

The doctrine of our discourse antagonizes not one single 
literal averment of Holy Scripture, though it is in antagonism to 
much current interpretation of Holy Scripture. It is the elucida- 
tion of much Holy Scripture which, otherwise, is without a satis- 
factory exegesis. In its light we see new significance in the 
declaration, " He is the first born of every creature ; M — the first 
creation or formation of matter is into a body for the everlasting 
Son of God. " For by Him were all things created, that are in 
heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible. . . .And He is 
before all things. ' ' And in the light of this doctrine, we also see 
new and full significance in the Divine utterance, " Let us make 
man in our image, after our likeness." 

And the doctrine of our discourse ennobles man. He was 
built after the style of God. And it magnifies the atonement 
made by the Son of God. L,ook at man as he is ; look at him as 
he was ; measure the intervening distance and difference ; and 
then measure, if you can, the value of his redemption. 

And this doctrine of our discourse also unfolds the reason of 
the ceaseless human aspiration after something higher. Man is 
never fully satisfied with aught that the world gives. Give him 
all he covets, and he is still hungry. Nothing here satisfies him. 

37 



Bvery satisfaction only whets his appetite. He feels that he is 
capable of a better estate. Created in the very likeness — material, 
mental and moral — of the Son of God, and once at home with the 
Son of God, he is ever seeking, sometimes consciously and some- 
times unconsciously, but ever seeking to get home again. 



38 



IV. 

" Amen."— Revelation, 22 : 21. 

A single word asks to be the center and inspiration of the medi- 
tation and worship of the current hour. It is the last word of the 
last verse of the last chapter of the last book of the Sacred Volume 
— the word Amen. It is a word which appears frequently in the 
Divine Oracles ; enters largely into the reported discourses of the 
Son of Man during His stay among men in the world ; is often 
heard in the assemblies of the saints before the throne ; is no for- 
eigner in the congregation of those who joy in the Lord while 
passing through this vale of sighs ; and is no stranger to our own 
lips when our hearts are aglow with the peace which passeth 
understanding. 

The word is of Hebrew derivation, and is properly an adjec- 
tive, signifying, directly, firm, and indirectly, faithful. Thus, in 
the sixteenth verse of the sixty-fifth chapter of Isaiah, God is 
called ' ' the God of Amen, ' ' though in our English version the 
rendering is ' c the God of truth ; ' ' and in the Revelation by John, 
Christ is denominated " the Amen, the faithful and true witness." 

In the adverbial form, it signifies certainly or surely or truly ; 
and it is employed at the commencement of a sentence as a chal- 
lenge of attention. In this manner Christ introduced many of 
His conversations and discourses : for a correct translation of 
M Verily, verily, I say unto you," is " Amen, Amen, I say unto 
you." It is also employed at the conclusion of a sentence as a 
confirmation or endorsement of what has just been said : as if the 
speaker added his affidavit to his declaration, " What I have just 
said is a fact ; ' ' or, M It is an obligation I will fulfil ; ' ' or, '* It is 
a wish I wish with all my heart and life may be granted. ' ' 

About this word lingers the savor of great antiquity. It is a 
very old word. 

Amid words of more recent origin, it looms up like some 
granite boulder which the rush of resistless waters has borne from 

39 



its original location, carried down the intervening mountain, and 
over the intervening plain, and placed far away from the scene of 
its primeval deposit or growth, in the midst of new and strange 
circumstances and conditions. 

It invests and thrills us with the atmosphere of the region and 
time of David, and reports that Christianity came of Judaism. It 
moves us back into the earliest years of the Dispensation of the 
Gospel ; and into the golden age when the multitude of them that 
believed were of one heart and soul ; and into the realization that 
V 1 there is one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father 
of us all, Who is above all, and through us all, and in us all." 

And this word is of universal use. It is in no manner a sec- 
tarian word. Ancient Judaism caught it from ante-Mosaic lips, 
and made it resound through the courts of the Temple of Solo- 
mon. And it sounds back and forth in every Jewish synagogue 
today. 

Roman Catholicism exacts it from the tongue of laymen and 
priest and prelate and Pope. And in it Protestantism embodies 
its conviction of the principle and rule of genuine devotion, and 
employs it in vindication of the prerogative of the congregation to 
exercise its own conscience and judgment in the service and 
worship of the Lord of all. 

Episcopalianism calls for its utterance largely along its estab- 
lished formulae, and demands that, in its utterance, the hearer 
will express his appropriation of the words of the reader. And 
Presbyterianism confirms in its pronunciation, at appointed periods, 
its benediction and covenant and invocation and prayer. And 
Methodism garnishes with it all its ceremonies and exercises, and 
insists on its frequent and spontaneous deliverance by her daugh- 
ters and sons, in both their private and public devotions. 

And thus it is the inheritance of entire Christendom. Many 
devout disciples of our common Lord bring no liturgy into their 
devotions ; and many do not declare their faith in the language 
of what we call the " Apostle's Creed ; " and many do not deliver 
their petitions in the use of " the Lord's Prayer ; " but there is no 

40 



Christian who does not say " Amen ' ' either with the spirit or with 
the tongue. 

And this word condenses into itself much of sacred and sub- 
lime significance. Giving it utterance, we affirm our attention; 
for its careless and reckless pronunciation is a sin and a shame. I 
may not employ it as a mere announcement of my presence, nor as 
a bid for commendation, nor as a proof that I have had my nap 
and am once more awake, nor in any manner without deliberate 
consciousness of its employment. I may speak it only when my 
whole soul is alert and responsive. 

And by its utterance we also affirm our comprehension. It is 
profane to pronounce it at a venture. How shall he say "Amen' 
who has no understanding of what is said ? I may pronounce it 
only when I have clear perception of the averment or prayer to 
which I respond " Amen." 

Its utterance also affirms our consecration. Failing in this, its 
employment is hypocrisy ; for, no matter how acute my attention 
and how clear my comprehension, the hallowed word may not es- 
cape my lips unless it is the inspiration of my heart — unless I 
cognize the sin I confess, crave the forgiveness I implore, desire 
the bliss besought, have faith in the doctrine preached, lean on 
the promise presented, and realize the mercy for which the dox- 
ology is sung. 

And we affirm, by its utterance, our devotion. It has no busi- 
ness on the banners of cowardice or indolence or negligence. It 
has no place in the conduct or vocabulary of the shirk. It sits 
becomingly only on his lips who consecrates his affections and 
energies to the advancement of the faith, and the doing of the 
work, which he thus endorses with his ' c Amen ; ' ' who gives his 
conduct to make his creed a conquest ; and who is faithful in that 
which is little, as well as in that which is much. 

And its utterance affirms our integrity. It has in it the import, 
as already denned, of reliable, true, trustworthy. It implies 
something on which you can depend, however changeful and 
shifting and veering is every person and everything else ; some- 

41 



thing on which you can hang, as a building on its foundation ; 
something on which you can rest, as a child on its mother's lap. 

In Oriental countries there is a belief that there is something 
in the mouth of an Anglo-Saxon which makes it impossible for him 
to tell a lie. I sometimes fear that, by diligent effort and long 
practice, our race is getting over its constitutional difficulty in 
this direction. But, surely, it ought to be a moral impossibility 
for a Christian to either act or tell a lie. Surely, he ought to be 
a constant and living Amen — a backbone which no burden or 
emergency can break ; a brother born for adversity ; a friend both 
in shadow and in sunshine ; a needle that never swerves from the 
pole ; a pillar which no pressure can overbear ; a standby in the 
front of the storm's wildest revel ; and a 

" Tower 
Which stands four-square to all the winds that blow "— 

an Israelite indeed, 

" Through all this tract of years, 
Wearing the white flowers of a blameless life 
Before a thousand peering littlenesses." 

And by uttering this word Amen, we affirm our love of tht 
household of faith. An impressive story tells of two strangers 
meeting on a vessel on an eastern sea, every day beholding them 
in each other's company and their hearts lovingly drawn to each 
other. But there is between them no common language for the 
expression of their feelings and thoughts. Although they try one 
language after another, they can find no verbal channel of com- 
munion, but can only sit in silence and speak in smiles. Finally, 
however, they find two words with which they are both familiar, 
learned from the missionaries in their respective countries, and 
which make them at home with each other. The one word is 
" Alleluia," and the other is " Amen." 

The utterance of the word also affirms our membership in the 
brotherhood which is in Jesus. I am not an isolated and solitary 
believer in the Son of Man. I am not the only man in possession 
of His mind and secret ; but I am of a multitude which no man 
can number. Just as my child hears in the sea-shell, which he 

' 42 



holds to his ear, the sound of many and remote waters, so I, say- 
ing " Amen " with all my soul, am of the crowding hosts who 
have escaped the corruptions which are in the world, and have be- 
come partakers of the Divine nature. From the ages of early 
human history, patriarchs assemble about me. From the altars 
of the Judaic Tabernacle and Temple, priests and prophets come 
to my elbow. From the dawn of the Christian Dispensation, dis- 
ciples and martyrs crowd to my fellowship. And from the paths 
of my own personal history, acquaintances and associates of 
former places and times, though now locally far away, gather to 
my side ; and my father is again in his pulpit, preaching ' l Jesus 
and the Resurrection ; ' ' and my mother is sunning me with her 
loving smile ; and my brothers and sisters are waiting with me at 
the family-altar ; and those of my own family who have gone up 
to Him of Whom the whole family in earth and in Heaven is 
named are wafting to me their sympathetic greetings ; and 

" Then, with the wings of faith I rise 

Within the veil and see 
The saints above, how great their joys, 

How bright their glories be, " 

as the four and twenty elders, and their companions who have 
washed their robes, and made them white in the blood of the 
Lamb, wake the welkin with their " Alleluia to the Lamb. ■* 

We also, by our utterance of this word Amen, affirm our 
recognition of Christ as Lord of all. A Democratic National Con- 
vention assembles for the nomination of a candidate for the Presi- 
dency. For a time the contest is almost angry. It looks as if 
the advocates of Bayard and Hancock and Tilden are apart be- 
yond all agreement. But finally Hancock bears off the palm, 
and hand-in-hand the party marches to the polls in his support, as 
if none had ever a thought of any other leader. A Republican 
National Convention gathers for the selection of its nominee for 
the same high office. Blaine's column is determined ; Grant's 
guards are as immovable as their own chief in front of the hordes 
of the Rebellion ; Sherman supporters are solid in their rally ; and 

43 



it seems as if a common consent is impossible ; but suddenly the 
hitherto unmentioned Garfield takes the warring elements by 
storm, and as one man the battling forces fall together into line. 
But no such harmony could be reached if the different denomina- 
tions had to meet today for the choice of the Head of the Chris- 
tian Church. The adherents of Calvin would cast every ballot 
for John of Geneva ; the followers of Luther would insist on Mar- 
tin of Wittemberg ; the sons of Wesley would sit out the longest 
caucus ever convened before they would see the name of John of 
Oxford placed second on a ticket to that of any other man ever born. 
But there is no such contest pending. The choice is made. There 
is unanimous sentiment among all creeds, however they vary in 
doctrines and forms, as to Him who is first. They all rally about 
the Cross of Calvary, and all shout the Name which is above every 
name. And, taking up their Amen, 

" At the Name of Jesus bowing, 

Falling prostrate at His feet, 
King of kings, in Heaven we'll crown Him, 

When our journey is complete." 

And, by our utterance of this word Amen, we affirm thorough 
and unfaltering trust in Him as our individual Saviour and Sufficiency 
— accepting Him as the Amen, the faithful and true Witness, the 
God of Amen, the Friend who sticketh closer than a brother, the 
precious Corner-stone, the sure Foundation, the tried Stone, the 
Rock of ages ; believing in Him as never breaking a covenant, or 
failing in an engagement, or forgetting a promise ; and resting in 
Him as our Amen. Conscious that his atoning blood is our deliv- 
erance, that His everlasting arms are about us, and that His Spirit 
is sealing us unto the day of eternal redemption, we welcome the 
day and awaken the night with the new song, 

" His oath, His covenant and blood 
Support me in the whelming flood : 

When all around my soul gives way, 
He then is all my hope and stay. 

On Christ the solid ground I stand- 
All other ground is sinking sand." 

Clearly, the word Amen should be no foreigner in Christian 

44 



assemblies, or stranger to Christian lips. It was a common ex- 
pression in the ancient Jewish Church. A Rabbinical authority 
declared, ' ' Whosoever says ' Amen,' to him are opened the gates of 
Paradise. ' ' And another said, ' ' Whosoever says 4 Amen' is greater 
than he that blesses. ' ' And yet another declared , ' ' Whosoever says 
* Amen' indistinctly, that is, with fear or hesitation or little volume, 
breathes an ' orphan Amen' — an Amen he is ashamed to father." 
It was a familiar expression in the early Christian Church. A 
public service was considered incomplete unless every now and 
then the congregation b}^ its Amens evidenced its appropriation of 
the discourses and petitions of the minister. The sacramental 
service was held to be lacking unless, as the communicant received 
the sacred symbol from the administrator, he affirmed by his Amen 
the reception of all the rite implies. The Amen wanting, would 
have been as astonishing a want as that of prayer or sermon or 
song. It was everybody's share in the service ; and it w T as heard 
in all the parts of the service — now coming forth as a cheer or a 
hurrah from individual lips, and now filling the place as a univer- 
sal shout, and now ringing through the room like a peal of thunder. 
It was a frequent expression in the early Methodist Church. Even 
many of you can recall the custom of our fathers in this respect 
— how they used it in the congregation, and in the social meeting, 
and in the worship of the family ; and how it would awe those 
who heard it into reverence, or bow them into penitence, or raise 
them into rapture. 

It is insisted that this word ought to be heard more frequently 
in our meetings for the worship of God. An absolute renewal of 
the venerable habit of our fathers in its use may not be essential. 
It may not be necessary that the congregation should shout it en 
masse, or in stentorian tones, or that the prayer should count as a 
failure or the song go for nothing or the sermon pass as worthless 
when there is no such response. It certainly should not be spoken 
only with the lips. But the sense of obligation to its utterance 
would have a tendency to stir the soul into the requisite readiness 
to stir the tongue. Bring it back again, then, into our assem- 

45 



blies for the benefit of the individual Christian. It will discover 
to him that the fellowship of the saints, with all its riches of in- 
spiration and instruction and unction, is nothing to him except as 
he makes these riches his own. It will keep him alive to his pre- 
cious obligations and privileges, and make him a teacher to him- 
self — enabling him to extract gold from a continent of mud, to 
educe enriching lessons from the feeblest sermon, and to find 
inspiration in the poorest-sung song, and to gather strength and 
uplift out of the shallowest and weakest supplication. To such 
treasures of grace and knowledge and might does his Amen pio- 
neer an earnest, saintly soul ; and such a soul never knew an hour 
of devotion which hung heavy on his hands. 

Bring it in again for the edification of fellow-Christians pres- 
ent with us. It will come as a soul-lifting hurrah to many a saint 
burdened with care or doubt or fear, about to fall on the field ot 
battle, and establish him in the ways of the Lord with the assur- 
ance that he is not a forsaken, solitary warrior ; that allies are at 
his elbow ; that reinforcements are hastening to his side ; and that 
the Name of the Lord is a strong tower into which the righteous 
runneth and is safe. And thus it will nerve him to run with new 
faith and patience and zeal the race set before him . 

Bring it in again for the incitement of those, in the congrega- 
tion, who are without the hope of the Gospel, to the pursuit of 
the things belonging to their eternal peace. It will call back to 
many a sinner the memory of former convictions, and impress 
them with new force upon his soul, and stir him to unwonted con- 
cern and effort — alarming the indifferent, constraining the irrev- 
erent, comforting the penitent, and reclaiming the prodigal. 

Bring it in again for the inspiration of those who lead in the 
worship of the sanctuary. It will be a light to them in many a 
period of darkness, and a tonic to them in many a season of weak- 
ness. It will be to them as good news from a far country, and as 
cold water to a thirsty soul. It will discover to them that their 
fellow-worshippers are in sympathy with them ; that thoughtful 
minds ponder their message ; that " the truth" is still the power 

46 



of God, though served in vessels of clay ; and that "the Word ol 
the Lord " still speaks, "not in word only, but also in power, and 
in the Holy Ghost, and in much assurance." 

Bring it in again, you who are ready to complain of uninter- 
esting and unprofitable sermons and services : for, largely, the 
lack of interest and profit lies at your door. It comes of your 
failure to becomingly meet your personal obligation to be inter- 
ested and profited. Your indifferent, prayerless mien makes you 
as insensible and unresponsive as stones. It makes you hinder- 
ances to your own spiritual enrichment. It makes you impedi- 
ments to the life of your companions in the house of God. And 
it makes you weights on the leaders of the worship, who no more 
can meet all the conditions of prosperous public worship than 
Moses could prevail against Amalek without the upholding of his 
hands by Aaron and Hur ; or than the Son of Man could win 
success in the midst of His unbelieving countrymen. O, that you 
icicles would realize how you chill and freeze to their inmost souls 
those who break to you the bread which cometh down from 
Heaven ! You would cease claiming to have the mind of Christ, 
or you would humble yourselves in the dust, and lie mourning 
there until the heat of the Sun of righteousness would thaw 
you out. 

"Come, Holy Ghost, for Thee we call: 

Spirit of burning, come ! 
Refining fire, go through our hearts ; 

Illuminate our souls ; 
Scatter Thy life through every part, 

And sanctify the whole." 

O, you godly men and women, who sometimes almost over- 
whelm us with your generous commendations of our services, we 
wish you could realize how largely, under God, the credit is your 
own. Often we come before you burdened, or poorly prepared, 
or sick, or worn, or worried ; and your Amen, either glancing in 
your eyes or trembling on your tongues, kindles our fainting souls ; 
lifts yourselves to Pisgah heights ; and raises the whole assembly 
into heavenly places in Christ Jesus. Poor or rich, strong or 

47 



weak, you are the pillars of the Church. The least of you is 
equal to a hundred, and the greatest of you is equal to a thou- 
sand. The Lord God of our fathers make you many more times 
as many as you are ! 

" Ye men of grace have found 

Glory begun below : 
Celestial fruit, on earthly ground, 

From faith and hope may grow." 

Bring it in again for a tribute due the blessed Redeemer. 
Each hearty, intelligent Amen to His cause and Name is a new 
satisfaction to His soul ; and a new sign that His kingdom is in- 
creasingly a live kingdom in the world ; and that His people, 
blooming with the beauty of holiness, and gleaming with the 
dew of youth, are as ever willing in the day of His power. And, 
with new gladness that His Word does not return unto Him void, 
but prospers in the thing whereto He has sent it, He will prose- 
cute His intercession before the throne : henceforth expecting that 
His enemies will be made His footstool, and that 

" To Him shall endless prayer be made. 
And endless praises crown His head : " 

henceforth expecting, with the prayer of the upright His delight, 
that 

" His Name, like sweet perfume, shall rise 
With every morning sacrifice," 

until 

" He shall have dominion 
O'er river, sea and shore, 
Far as the eagle's pinion 
Or dove's light wing can soar." 

Amen was a favorite word with the Son of Man. Hardly 
any other word was so frequently on his lips. You meet it over 
seventy times in the Gospel record of His conversations and dis- 
courses. As we catch, through the Apocalyptic telephone, the 
sound of their devotion who throng the temple of the New 
Jerusalem, it enlivens their worship as a bit of their daintiest 
manna. As we listen at the door where the saints of early ages 
and dipensations are assembled for the cultivation of themselves 

48 



in the things of God, it is the frequent expression of their spirit- 
ual exhilaration. As we recall the halcyon days of our fathers and 
mothers, as leaving the first principles of the doctrine of Christ, 
and going on unto perfection, it was their song and their shout. 
As we recollect the times when we were alert and glad with the 
peace that is as a river and the righteousness that is as the waves 
of the sea, it, spoken by others, was a challenge forward, and, 
spoken by ourselves, was a leap of response to their stirring call. 
Its strangeness in our assemblies and in our hearts is a pall 
and a weakness ; for, in its spirit and utterance the flame of devo- 
tion is intensified, and the power of prayer is multiplied an 
hundred-fold. One asking for better things for himself, and the 
others crying Amen, it is a dozen or a score of prayers instead of 
one. One asking for the conversion of his family, and the others 
crying Amen, it is one prayer with an hundred endorsements. 
One asking for the Church revival experience and revival power, 
and the others crying Amen, it is a whole church marshalling the 
violence which taketh the " Kingdom of Heaven" by storm. 
One asking for new grace for a new emergency, and the others 
crying Amen, it is the voice of many waters bearing him forward 
with resistless tide. One asking that his Christian brethren may 
give him greeting over a richer experience or progress, and the 
others crying Amen, Oh, what glory crowns the hour as all sing 

"Amen, Amen, my soul replies, 
Go on, I'm bound to meet you in the skies." 

The bugle sounds. Amen, bearer of fragrant memories ! 
Amen, charter of hallowed prospects ! Amen, word from the 
vernacular of Heaven ! Amen, channel by which the devotions 
of the redeemed, for crowding centuries, have been discharging 
themselves in the ear of their Redeemer ! Amen, language in 
which the members of the ' ' General Assembly and Church of the 
Firstborn which are written in Heaven," pay their praises to the 
"Lion of the tribe of Judah ! " Amen, medium by which my 
father and mother used to proclaim the love of the Lover of 
their souls ! Amen, tongue by which my own soul poured out 

49 



its song as I bowed in penitential desire, and as I came up from 
the " fountain filled with blood," and a thousand times since as 
I found a new peace and won a new victor} 7 ! Amen, trumpet 
whose blast has stirred me again and again in cathedral and 
chapel, in congregation and social meeting, in private and public: 
which I have heard in city and country, and from the lips of child- 
hood and maturity, and from the lips of the glad and the sorrow- 
ing, and from the lips of the living and the dying, — O, be my 
Amen ! Ever and anon may I cry it out of a full, joyous heart. 
Evermore may I live it : exultant, faithful, trusting. Life amid 
mortal scenes closing up, earthly shadows fleeing away, the sun 
of a cloudless morning and of an endless da}' breaking on my rap- 
tured vision, may Amen, the hurrah of my probation, be my pass- 
word to the recompense to be revealed at the resurrection of the 
just ! Then, as in the last word of the last verse of the last 
chapter of the last book of God's last written revelation to man, 
Amen gathers all its previous benedictions and promises into one 
bright, full expression ; so in the last hour of the last day of the 
last year of my stay in the land of the dying, may I call out a 
glad Amen to all the way the Lord hath led me, and, bounding 
into all the bliss of the glorified and immortal, unite with you, 
and with all who have gone thither out of our homes, and with all 
who " are without fault before the throne of God," in the jubilant 
acclaim, 

" For ever with the Lord < 
Amen, so let it be ! " 



50 



V. 

" And when he saw the wagons which Joseph had sent to carry him, the 
spirit of Jacob their father revived." — Gbnesis, 45:27. 

Far away and long ago there lives an old man whose whole 
heart is bound up in one darling boy. He is naturally a man of 
very strong and tender sensibilities : his affections lie very near 
the surface of his being. Nevertheless, his entire career seems to 
be a long, unbroken series of assaults upon his soul. Cherishing 
his home, he is a constant exile from its roof. Delighting in his 
mother, he is early forced from her embrace, and never lays his 
head in her lap again. Fond of his wife, his beloved Rachel goes 
down into a premature grave. Petting his children, his daughters 
and sons oppress him with concern and distress. Some twenty 
years ago his favorite son went forth on an errand, and has never 
returned — it is reported that he was slain by wild beasts. Some 
two years famine has locked the land in its clutch. Thus far he 
has obtained bread in a neighboring land, but one of his sons is a 
hostage in its prison. 

Once more bread must be had, and his dearest remaining son 
has gone to Egypt as the condition of its obtainment. How dreary 
the days of his absence ! How heavy the anxieties which bear 
down the old pilgrim's soul ! How impenetrable the clouds which 
shadow his skies ! How stem the vigils which task his unsleep- 
ing eyes ! How dead are his hopes ! How little care he has to 
live ! How longingly he awaits the advancing grave ! 

One morning, however, looking along the road over which 
his absent sons had journeyed in quest of food, a coming caravan 
meets his gaze. Coming nearer, he discerns the familiar forms 
which have grown up around his knees. Pausing in his presence, 
he discovers a new supply of food, recognizes Benjamin, recog- 
nizes Simeon, and gratefully sees that no new disaster has fallen 
on his home. There is more, too, than merely a stay of calamity. 
The heavens wear a brighter face. The air is vocal with good 
tidings. The returning children shout with one voice, ''Father, 

51 



Joseph is not dead. He is alive. He is well. He is prosperous. 
He is vice-governor of Egypt. He wants us to move there. He 
says he will take care of us. ' ' 

Sometimes good news is told too suddenly to be borne. The 
condemned have died on hearing the message of their pardon. 
The poor have died on learning of their inheritance of wealth. 
The doorkeeper of Congress died when listening to the report of 
the capture of Cornwallis. There moved, some years ago, a woman 
from England to Chicago. She pined for the mother she had 
left behind. She concluded finally that she must go back and see 
the dear old face again. The week before she was to start, her 
mother, unannounced, entered her room, and the daughter died 
in her mother's arms. Thus, the announcement of Joseph's life 
and prosperity stuns Jacob. For a moment, his reason reels. He 
cannot credit the report. 

Thinking it all over, however, he says to himself, " It may 
be that Joseph is alive. I was never really assured of his death. 
Eleven witnesses agree in the statement concerning him. They 
know him well. They have no motive to deceive me. Their 
story of Joseph's treatment of Benjamin is natural, for they are 
children of the same mother. The message which they bring 
from him to me is just like him, for he was always devoted to me. 
These wagons are circumstantial evidence of the truth of their 
story ; for my sons had no money to spend in wagons, and nobody 
else would waste money in a fraud on a poor old man." The last 
doubt gives way. Faith is constrained. And he says, " It is 
enough. Joseph is alive. I will go and see him before I die." 

Almost twenty centuries ago, a new Brother is born into the 
human family. He is the Brother of every member of our race ; 
for, "when the fulness of the time was come, God sent forth 
His Son, made of a woman, made under the law, to redeem them 
that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of 
sons." He is especially the Brother of those who accept Him in 
His atonement ; for, pointing to His disciples, He says, " Behold 
My mother and My brethren ! For whosoever shall do the will of 

52 



My Father which is in Heaven, the same is My brother, and sister, 
and mother." 

He crowds His whole life on earth with good works to the 
children of men : seeking to better and brighten the condition of 
all with whom He comes in contact ; and seeking to create condi- 
tions which will rain benedictions on all who shall subsequently 
come into being. 

Nevertheless, coming to His own, His own will not receive 
Him. He is denounced, despised, rejected. Betrayal and per- 
jury follow Him every day. Betrayal and perjury hound Him to 
death. Crucified between two notorious malefactors, He gives 
up His life ; and His body is laid away in a tomb. No wonder 
that the Church goes into mourning, that the earth staggers at the 
infamy enacted on its bosom, and that the heavens wrap themselves 
in shadows ! 

But good news is in the air : good tidings salute our ears. It 
is reported that He, after all, is not dead ; that He has not been 
lying all these years in the tomb of Joseph of Arimathea ; that, 
the third day following His burial, He burst the barriers of the 
tomb ; and that He is alive for evermore, having in His hands 
the keys of death and hell. 

It is reported that He, forty days following His resurrection, 
ascended from the heights of Olivet to the heights of Heaven, lead- 
ing captivity captive. 

It is reported that He is the King of the Heaven whither He 
has ascended, His Father having highly exalted Him, and having 
given Him a name that is above every name. 

It is reported that He is the Possessor of infinite perfections, 
and the Proprietor of infinite resources, being Lord of all. 

It is reported that He is the Source of all our mercies and of 
all our supplies — the Father of lights, with whom is no variable- 
ness, neither shadow of turning, from Whom cometh down every 
good gift and every perfect gift. 

It is reported that He wants us to go and live with Him ; to 
pass eternity in His presence, where there is fullness of joy ; to 

53 



spend immortality at His right hand, where there are pleasures for 
evermore. 

And it is reported that He will find us transportation ; that He 
will furnish all we need along the way; and that He will give us 
compensation for all that we have to abandon for the journey — 
that He will give us a heart of flesh for the heart of stone, a gar- 
ment of praise for the spirit of heaviness, plenty for penury, songs 
for sighs, triumph for tears, friendships which shall know no rup- 
ture, raiment which shall never go out of style, and an everlast- 
ing inheritance among them who are without fault before the 
throne of God. 

Good news, indeed ! But it seems too good to be believed. 
We are descendants of those who saw neither comeliness nor form 
in our Brother during the days of His incarnation among men. 
The sin of the fathers is on their children. We held the clothes 
of those who nailed Him to the cross. We, with our sins, were 
parties to His crucifixion. We, in the exercise of our own voli- 
tion, have been guilty of His rejection. We have been disobedi- 
ent to His summons to the embracement of His salvation. We 
have been unfaithful in our stewardship. We have grieved Him 
b}^ a thousand falls. We are in no way essential to Him. He 
can do without us. In Himself all fulness dwells. The angels 
chant His glory. The cherubim sing His praise. The seraphim 
wait His will. 

We cannot credit the tidings that He is alive. Leave us 
alone in our despair. Paint no illusions in our eyes. Speak no 
mockeries in our ears. We will go down into the grave mourn- 
ing. 

" How can it be, Thou Heavenly King, 

That Thou should'st us to glory bring : 
Make slaves the partners of Thy throne, 

Decked with a never-fading crown? " 

Nevertheless, let us reflect before we reject the message sent 
us. It is brought to us by men who had ample opportunity to 
ascertain the facts ; who had no motive to fabricate falsehood ; 
who persisted in their narrative when they had nothing to gain by 



its recital, and everything to lose ; who spoke as they were moved 
by the Holy Ghost ; and who went to death still telling their story. 

It is impossible, if it is a fabrication, to conceive the circum- 
stances or the source of its invention. It is impossible to imagine 
the idea or the reason of its invention. It is impossible to imagine 
that good men would set themselves to tell far and wide a stupen- 
dous lie. It is impossible to imagine that wicked men would set 
themselves to work out a system of belief which sets its face as a 
flint against all wickedness. The enemies of humanity could not 
have perpetrated such a monstrous fraud ; and the friends of 
humanity would not have perpetrated it. 

It is just such a message as we might have expected from our 
Brother. It is just such a message as our knowledge of Him 
while He was among men would have led us to look for. While 
He was in the world He went about doing good. His acts were 
acts of charity. His thoughts were thoughts of mercy. His 
words were words of pity. His life was a life of love. His 
death was a death of sacrifice for His lost brothers and sisters ; 
and, just before His death, He made His will, leaving them His 
peace, and promising to come again and receive them unto Him- 
self. Verily, His thoughts are not as our thoughts, nor His ways 
as our ways ; but as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are 
His ways thau our ways, and His thoughts than our thoughts ! 

Then, see the circumstantial evidence that He is alive and 
caring for us. See the wagons He has sent to bring us supplies 
for our pilgrimage, and to carry us home to Himself. 

Here is the Bible, announcing the existence of an inheritance 
incorruptible, and undenled, and that fadeth not away ; delineat- 
ing the path to its possession ; and inspiring us to its pursuit. 

Here is the Church, warning every man, and teaching every 
man in all wisdom , that it may present every man perfect in Christ 
Jesus. 

Here is the Christian home, declaring to impressible child- 
hood, the story of the Great Lover of little children, fashioning it 
into His image, and training it up to fear the Lord from its youth. 

55 



Here is the Sabbath-school, anticipating the instructions of 
the Church and emphasizing the instructions of the home, and 
seeking to secure for God the orphans and waifs in whose ears 
there is neither Church nor home to sing the old, old story of 
Jesus and His love. 

Here is good fortune, endeavoring to captivate us into love 
and service of the Fount of every blessing, by a consideration of 
the great things He hath done for us. 

Here is misfortune, endeavoring to detach us from love and 
service of the carnal and dying, and lead us to lay up for our- 
selves treasure in Heaven. 

Here is the Holy Spirit, girdling us with His directions, in- 
spirations and motions, and proposing to seal us unto the day of 
eternal redemption. 

Here are angels, camping about us in all our itinerancy ; keep- 
ing in our memory the words of our ascended Brother, spoken 
while He was still with us in the flesh ; and ministering in mani- 
fold ways to the heirs of salvation. 

There is death, looking in the distance like a hearse, but turn- 
ing out to be the family carriage of our beloved Brother, waiting to 
carry the whole family, one by one, up into His beatific presence 
of Whom the whole family in earth and in heaven is named. 

There, on the throne, is our Brother, brandishing His cross, 
ever making intercession for us, filling the wagons, sending them 
forth with their loads of blessing, and yearning for our consent to 
dower us with an exceeding and eternal weight of glory. 

Verily, the message is reliable. Our Brother is alive ! He 
loves us with a love passing, beyond comparison, all other loves ; 
He supplies all our need, according to His riches in glory ; and 
He wants us to come and live with Him amid felicities and 
grandeurs which beggar description and leave fancy halting far 
behind. Blessed be the Lord God, the God of Israel, Who only 
doeth wondrous things. And blessed be His glorious name for 
ever. And let the whole earth be filled with His glory. Amen, 
and Amen. 

S6 



" I know that rny Redeemer lives ; 

What joy the blest assurance gives ! 
He lives, He lives, Who once was dead ; 

He lives my everlasting Head ! " 

A multitude no man can number, crowds gathered from all 
churches and climes and generations, many gathered from all our 
homes, have already finished their pilgrimage, gone up the steeps 
of light, and reached the Jerusalem above with everlasting joy 
upon their heads. 

Crowding hosts, among them those who are bone of our bone, 
and flesh of our flesh, are on the way, and every nightfall 

" Pitch their moving tents 
A day's march nearer home." 

Many of us have made good progress along the heavenly 
higlrway. Only a few short miles intervene between us and the 
land of our faith and hope and toil. Only over yon hill, and our 
eyes shall catch sight of the city which hath foundations, and our 
ears drink in its enrapturing melodies, and our hands lock hands 
with the darlings who have gone on before ! Only this one step 
separates us from our Brother's presence and our Brother's wel- 
come. 

None of us must miss that welcome. None of us must be- 
come discouraged because of the way. None of us must faint 
because one w T agon in the train carries affliction. Why, in every 
campaign the soldier is as careful to have along the wagon which 
carries the case of instruments and the chest of medicines, as that 
which carries the ammunition or rations or tents. True, no chast- 
ening for the present seemeth to be joyous, but grievous ; never- 
theless, afterward it yieldeth the peaceable fruit of righteousness 
unto them which are exercised thereby. 

No ! Discouragement must have no foothold within our 
souls. Let us thank God, and take courage. Let us run the 
whole length of the celestial road. The road is almost over. To 
them who by patient continuance in well-doing seek for glory aad 
honor, and immortality, eternal life. 

Listen ! Its raptures charge the air. Look ! Its turrets 

57 



flash in the distance. See ! Its gates are ajar. Yonder, familiar 
forms line its battlements. Yonder, waits our Brother. 

The Archbishop of Nantz, bending beneath the burden of 
ninety years, lies on a lounge, listening to his son read the last 
two chapters of the Revelation of St. John ; and he calls for his 
hat and staff that he may start at once for the city to come. Mrs. 
Doremus dying, bids her children and husband farewell ; and, as 
if she saw Him waiting her wish, says, " Jesus, bring the chariot." 
Thus, ever-ready, let us press forward. We shall fear no evil. 
We shall suffer no want. We shall realize that all things work 
together for our good, and that our strength is according to our 
day. We shall finish our pilgrimage with joy; and, stepping into 
the wagon of death, find it as sumptuous a chariot as ever carried 
a king to his coronation, or as that in which Enoch ascended from 
antediluvian plains, or as that in which Elijah mounted from the 
banks of Jordan. 

'" Leaning on Jesus' breast, 

Shall I resign my breath ; 
And in His kind embraces lose 

The bitterness of death." 



f>8 



VI. 

"Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except a corn of wheat fall into the 
ground and die, it abideth alone : but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit." 
—John, 12:24. 

A little less than nineteen centuries ago, the feast of the Pass- 
over is stirring Jerusalem through and through. The inhabitants 
of the city are arranging for its appropriate celebration. Multi- 
tudes of strangers are there to share in the excitements and 
solemnities of the occasion. 

A rumor reports that Jesus of Nazareth is on His way to the 
city, and immense numbers go forth to meet Him and to welcome 
Him with their Hosannas. Among them are certain Greeks who, 
having heard of His fame, and observing these demonstrations in 
His honor, and seeking fuller knowledge of His character and 
claims, say to Philip, " We would see Jesus." Coming into His 
presence, the}^ discover little in harmony with their previous con- 
ceptions. There is no diadem on His brow. There is no sceptre 
in His hand. To look upon, He is merely a man. Besides, He 
is even now within the shadow of the great eclipse. In a few 
short hours He is to be condemned as a blasphemer and a 
traitor, executed in company with two notorious malefactors, and 
laid away in the grave ; and under these circumstances not only 
the faith of these eager strangers, but also that of His most earn- 
est friends, may falter and give way. 

Guarding against such a disastrous issue, He says, ' ' ' Verily, 
verily, I say unto you, Except a corn of wheat fall into the 
ground and die, it abideth alone : but if it die, it bringeth forth 
much fruit.' Do not be deceived by appearances. You have ac- 
cepted Me as the Messiah. You have confided in Me as the Salva- 
tion of humanity. You have looked for Me to gather all nations 
under My standard, and to reign, the world over, King of kings 
and Lord of lords. Your belief is correct. Your expectations 
will be realized. Do not give up your hopes. My glorification 
involves My sufferings. The way to the morning lies through the 

59 



night. The fruitage comes of decay. The harvest grows out of 
the grave where the seed lies buried. The tomb is the birth- 
place of life. ' ' 

It is a masterly presentment of the truth as it is in Himself. 
His auditors have seen His miracles, and witnessed His recent 
triumphal march. They are looking every moment for the irre- 
sistible and visible establishment of His kingdom. And He 
assures them that His kingdom will be set up — that even now He 
is on His way to His throne ; but not in the way of their imagina- 
tion. His coronation is to come of His deeper humiliation ; and, 
as they cannot, at once, apprehend how this can be, He illumi- 
nates His doctrine by the illustration of our study. 

By death to life, is the order of the vegetable world. It is 
not the growing grain, full of juice and life, that you plant in hope 
of development and multiplication. Cast such a grain into the 
ground, and it will never have a resurrection. No rain will ever 
allure it from its bed. No sunshine will ever break its sleep. No 
vernal voice will ever stir it into waking. Its sleep is eternal. 
Therefore, before you bury it in the soil, you want to know that 
it has come to maturity, that it is fully developed, that it has 
reached its perfection, that it is dead ripe. 

Selecting this grain, you deposit it in the ground, and it dies. 
Every particle of it perishes, except the germ ; and this subsists 
on the decaying husks worn in its former estate until able to 
gather sustenance and vitality from the ministries of earth and 
sky. Thus dying, it comes up in newness of life — the same, and 
not the same ; the same, but manifold more. It abideth not 
alone. It bringeth forth thirty, sixty, yea, an hundred fold more. 
Like Sarah, it is the mother of millions. 

By death to life, is also the order of the animal world. A 
mother comes down to the very gates of death as her child is born. 
Under the most favorable circumstances, she is never hence the 
entire woman she was before. Forever hence she has parted with 
a portion of herself. Forever hence she has less of her own 
vitality. And, in innumerable instances, he who is born is actu- 

60 



ally the death of her who has borne him. Parturition has been 
too much for maternal strength ; and she never rallies from the 
shock. Opening the portals of life to her son, those portals close 
upon herself, and her place in the world knows her no more. 

Every child of due sensibility, as he realizes how he came to 
be, will be held to filial love and service with a fondness and a 
fulness which no force or wile can abate. If his mother is still 
in the land of the living, he will lavish on her an affection and a 
care equal to his capacity and opportunity. If she has gone the 
way of all the earth, he will keep her memory green until memory 
shall again and for ever be communion. 

By death to life, is also the order of the social world. Ap- 
parent backsets and defeats have lined the path of every forward 
movement of humanity. It has made but little progress directly 
and immediately. The expectations of reformers have rarely 
been met in the manner and ratio of their expectations. 

Ecclesiastical, educational and political economies have been 
devised and inaugurated, which appeared to be all that could be 
desired, commanded heart} 7 acceptance, and promised large im- 
provement and prosperity in the circle of their actions. Their 
advocates and friends fondly pronounced them perfection and 
success. Finally, however, new inspirations came, or new neces- 
sities developed, or new plans suggested themselves ; and new 
parties and propositions marched to the front. Oppositions be- 
came engendered. Conservatives and Progressives entered the 
lists with each other. The advocates of advanced measures were 
branded as heretics or traitors ; were excluded from their old con- 
nections and places ; and, in many instances, were put to death ; 
and, for a time, their measures lay seemingly as dead as them- 
selves. 

Thus it is that doctrines are adopted, and methods are chosen, 
and policies are made regnant. Progress is born of the defeat of 
those who first lift its banners and ring its bells. They who call 
to revolution are scarcely ever in at the triumph. Somebody has 
to die as seed-corn. 

61 



By death to life, is also the order of the religious world. A 
man is met at the very threshold of the Christian life with the 
announcement of Him Who is its Giver, " If any man will be My 
disciple, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow 
Me." And subsequently, his life long, his sentiment is to be, 
" God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord 
Jesus Christ, by Whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto 
the world." And, going up into the inheritance of the climax of 
the benefactions of the Son of God, — the ' ' house not made with 
hands, eternal in the heavens," — he must actually die. Canaan 
is beyond the Jordan. Heaven is on the other side of the sepul- 
chre. ' ' Flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God ; 
neither doth corruption inherit incorruption. When this cor- 
ruptible shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have 
put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that 
is written, Death is swallowed up in victory." Then shall we cry, 
beyond all fear of challenge, " O, death, where is thy sting? O, 
grave, where is thy victory? Thanks be to God, Who giveth us 
the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ." 

Every individual advancement in the Divine life, long as we 
tread the thoroughfares of Probation, is conditioned on a death. 
The old Adam must die, that the new Adam may be born. The 
heart of stone must be given up, that the heart of flesh may be 
our possession. The devil and the flesh and the world must be 
surrendered, that we may become the dwelling-place of the 
Father and the Son and the Spirit. The evil propensities of our 
nature must be eradicated, that the graces of the Divine nature 
may come up from their graves. The vices of the fall must be 
uprooted, that the virtues offered in the Redemption may live and 
thrive. Ye who are born of God, " Know ye not that so many of 
us as were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into His 
death? Likewise, reckon ye yourselves to be dead, indeed, unto 
sin, but alive unto God through our Lord Jesus Christ." " I am 
crucified with Christ : nevertheless, I live ; yet not I, but Christ 
liveth in me : and the life which I live in the flesh, I live by the 

62 



faith of the Son of God, Who loved me, and gave Himself for 
me." 

Longing to be an angel of salvation unto others, I must em- 
bark my life in the hallowed ministry. I must lay my life out for 
my brethren, — and all men are my brethren; — for, "He that 
loveth his life shall lose it, and he that hateth his life in this 
world shall keep it unto life eternal." The resurrection of the 
dead in sin and trespass is so great and heavenly an achievement 
as to demand and justify the outlay of the life of those who have 
the mind of Christ, if nothing less will accomplish the sublime 
resurrection. They who have the burden of souls would die to 
save them. 

The lack of this consecration may be the reason of our failure 
in Christian work. Fathers and mothers, would you die that 
your children ma}- be alive unto God ? Fellow-members of the 
Church and of the Sabbath-school, would we die that those under 
our care, and with whom we come in touch every day, who are 
out of Christ, may lay hold of eternal life ? It is told of the 
brothers of an old Franciscan convent that, during the prevalence 
of a plague, they gave themselves up to the care of those smitten 
— each going out on his mission in the morning, and, if able, re- 
turning in the evening to an out-house near the convent, and 
ringing a bell to indicate that he was still alive. If that bell was 
not heard ringing at sundown, another brother went out to rescue 
the first if he was in need, and to succeed him if he had fallen. 
On the staying of the plague, twenty-four monks had died ; but 
hundreds of lives had been saved. Readily enough, still, men will 
face death for any cause they have at heart — to defend their 
country, or to gather riches, or to prosecute studies. Shall those 
who have the ' ' Gospel in trust ' ' have less concern for those who 
are " without God and without hope in the world ? " 

" Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except a corn of wheat fall 
into the ground and die, it abideth alone : but if it die, it bringeth 
forth much fruit. " Do we aspire to be new creatures in Christ 
Jesus ? It is life for life. Do we covet the highest experiences 

63 



and rewards possible to the saint ? It is life for life. Do we long 
to see the world delivered from Satanic clutch, and laid a trophy 
at Immanuel's feet ? It is life for life. 

" More of Thy life, and more I have, 

As the Old Adam dies : 
Bury me, Saviour, in Thy grave, 

That I with Thee may rise." 

By death to life, is also the order of Christ in the redemption 
of the world. A Divine decree in the economy of the Divine gov- 
ernment cannot undo the mischief of the human lapse, and lift 
lapsed man back into the character and condition of his creation. 
God, indeed, is Love, looking with pitying eyes upon the fallen 
creature of His hand, and yearning for his recovery. God, how- 
ever, is a just, as well as merciful, Sovereign, bound to conserve 
the majesty of His government, and to maintain His personal 
rectitude. Law ma}' not be broken, even in the interest of human 
escape from the punishment of its transgression. Mercy may not 
trample righteousness in the mire. The penalty of sin is death. 
Without the shedding of blood there is no remission. 

Coming, therefore, into the world, proposing its redemption, 
the Son of God is confronted with the fact that man is under sen- 
tence of death, and that He Who would be his Redeemer must die 
in his stead. Death, however, is humiliating and sorrowful even 
to an offending mortal ; but how infinitely more humiliating and 
sorrowful to the Lord of all being ! Is it any wonder that, in its 
prospect, He cries, " Father, if it is Thy will, let this cup pass 
from Me ? ' ' Still, He falters not. He assumes the sinner's stead, 
and takes on Him the iniquities of us all. He dies for the un- 
godly. He gives His life a ransom for the many. He tastes 
death for every man. Verily, it " is a faithful sa3^ing, and worthy 
ol all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save 
sinners." " Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, 
being made a curse for us." " He was wounded for our trans- 
gressions, He was bruised for our iniquities : the chastisement of 
our peace was upon Him ; and with His stripes we are healed." 

64 



The Divine Corn of Wheat, dropping from the skies into the soil 
of humanity, proposing to bring forth a harvest of redemption, 
died. 

" He took the dying traitor's place, 

And suffered in his stead : 
For sinful man— O, wondrous grace 

For sinful man He bled." 

Glance backward, and see what a harvest has already come of 
the sowing of this Corn of Wheat ! As it is committed to the 
ground, its enemies congratulate themselves on the destruction of 
all its endowments and possibilities of life ; and its friends sorrow 
over the frustration of their hopes that this was He Who should 
have redeemed Israel, and wrought out the redemption of the 
world. But the eye of Omniscience is on the buried seed, and the 
energies of Omnipotence ply it with vitalizing forces. Immortal 
Spring winds its mellow horn ; the superincumbent sod gives way; 
and, God of goodness, what blooming fruitage fills the enraptured 
vision ! 

Divine authority is illustrated and vindicated ; and yet God 
can be just, and justify the ungodly. Law is magnified, and made 
honorable ; and yet illimitable and innumerable channels open up 
for the tides of grace. Lost humanity is within the reach of home 
and peace ; and yet the highest interests of the universe are con- 
served and fortified. The Holy Spirit is Divinely sensitive to sin ; 
and yet, laying hold of sin-stained humanity, eliminates its cor- 
ruption, fashions it anew, and transforms it into the likeness and 
temple of God. 

Greatly the majority of the children of men die in infancy; 
and yet all going down into the grave beneath the dew of child- 
hood go directly into the arms of the Great Lover of little chil- 
dren — through His atonement gifted with the laurel, without 
running the race of Probation. Just a glimpse of the coming prom- 
ised Seed of the woman is had by those of the Patriarchal era ; 
and yet they see something of the day of Christ afar off, and leap 
to meet Him in more radiant scenes. Largely the Mosaic econ- 
omy is an economy of burdens and taxes ; and yet its subjects 

65 



make their way into the presence of the Great Burden-Bearer, 
and reap re.st for their souls. Paganism is a land of darkness and 
shadow ; and yet they who make the best of their starlight, see a 
star which leads them to the ' ' Lamb of God who taketh away the 
sin of the world." 

Messiah appears without form or comeliness, a root out of dry 
ground ; and yet all who receive Him in the day of His incarna- 
tion receive the power and the right to become the children of 
God. Since His ascension, generation after generation has gone 
the way of all the earth ; and yet all who have followed Him in 
the way of the regeneration have realized Him to be the strength 
of their heart, and their portion for ever. None trusting in Him 
has ever been left desolate. Today multitudes have never seen 
incarnate Deity; and yet, though they see Him not, they believe 
on Him, and love Him, and rejoice with joy unspeakable and full 
of glory. 

Surely, this buried Corn of Wheat did not die fruitless. All 
the glorification of God and redemption of man which we have 
just reviewed are its outgrowth. Its inherent vitality has been too 
much for the tomb of Joseph in which it was hidden nineteen cen- 
turies since. The atonement is no failure : hell is not so full as 
we have imagined ; and Heaven is fuller than we have reckoned. 

Look forward, and see what a harvest is yet to come of the 
sowing of this Corn of Wheat ! For still the harvest is on the 
way. The grain planted on Calvary is still bearing fruit. Christ 
is still winning trophies. He is to have the heathen for His in- 
heritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth for His possession. 
He is to have all His enemies put under His feet. The God 
of the whole earth He is to be called. 

O, it is an harvest yet beyond compass — a yield beyond com- 
putation. Arithmetic breaks down in front of the crowding fig- 
ures. Faith can not count the swelling numbers. Imagination 
cannot master the transcendent sum. So large, nineteen hundred 
years ago, when seen by John from Patmos, was the congregation 
already assembled from earth in Heaven, that no man could num- 

66 



ber it. O, what a multitude it must be now, with the increment 
of the intervening centuries ! 

To measure this, however, would not be to measure the total 
of the yield of the Seed sown when Jesus of Bethlehem gave up 
the ghost and went down into the tomb. If I would see the whole 
harvest, in all its amplitude and luxuriance, I must wait — wait 

" Until this earth I walk on seems not earth, 
This light that strikes my eyeball is not light, 

This air that smites my forehead is not air, 
Bnt vision — yea, my very hand and foot — 

In moments when I feel I cannot die, 
And know myself no vision to myself, 
Nor the high God a vision, nor that One 
Who rose again :" 

wait until, after millions of years, on some boundless plain of the 
better country, even the Heavenly, the ransomed of the Lord, 
with songs and everlasting joy upon their heads, are all assembled 
for review — their bodies fashioned after the body of the Son of 
God, and their souls washed from the slightest stain of sin : — 
wait until, climbing some lofty summit of the land of pure delight 
and vision, my eye can range an illimitable circuit, and my intel- 
lect can sweep an immeasurable field : — wait until, the immortal 
having swallowed up the mortal, I can poise myself for an arch- 
angel's view, and can take in all that has come of the oblation of 
Immanuel to the children of men along the paths they have 
already come, and all that is to come along the paths they are yet 
to traverse : — wait until 

" The beatific sight 
Shall fill the heavenly courts with praise, 
And wide diffuse the golden blaze 
Of everlasting light." 



" Have you heard the tale of the Aloe plant, 

Away in the sunny clime? 
By humble growth of an hundred years, 

It reaches its blooming time ; 
And, then, a wondrous bud at its crown 

Bursts into a thousand flowers : 
This floral green, in its beauty seen, 

Is the pride of the tropical bowers ; 
But the plant to the flower is a sacrifice, 
For it blooms but once, and in blooming dies. 

67 



" Have you further heard of tkis Aloe plant, 

That grows in the sunny clime ? 
How every one of its thousand flowers, 

As they fall in the blooming time, 
Is an infant tree that fastens its roots 

In the place where they fall to the ground, 
And, fast as they drop from the dying stem, 

Grow lively and lovely around ? 
By dying it livethca thousand fold 
In the young that spring from the death of the old. 

" Have you heard the tale of the Pelican, 

The Arab's Gimel El Bahr. 
That lives in the African solitudes, 

Where the birds that live lonely are? 
Have you heard how it loves its tender young, 

And toils and cares for their good ? 
It brings them water from fountains afar, 

And fishes the sea for their food. 
In famine it feeds them — what love can devise ! — 
The blood of its bosom, and, feeding them, dies. 

" Have you heard the tale they tell of the Swan, 

The snow-white bird of the lake ? 
It noiselessly floats on the silvery wave — 

It silently sits on the break ; 
For it saves, its song till the close of life, 

And, then, in the calm still even, 
'Mid the golden rays of the setting sun, 

It sings as it soars to Heaven : 
And the blessed notes fall back from the skies — 
'Tis its only song, for in singing it dies. 

'• You have heard these tales. Shall I tell you one, 

A greater and better than all ? 
Have you heard of Him Whom the Heavens adore, 

And before Whom the hosts of them fall — 
How He left His choirs and anthems above, 

For earth in its wailings and woes, 
To suffer the shame and pain of the cross, 

And die for the life of His foes? 
O, Prince of the Noble ! O, Saviour Divine ! 
What sorrow or sacrifice equal to Thine ! 

" Have you heard of this tale, the best of them all- 

The tale of the Holy and True ? 
He dies, but His life now in untold souls 

Springs up in the world anew. 
His seed prevails, and is filling the earth, 

As the stars fill the sky above. 
He taught us to give up the love of life, 

For the sake of the life of lore. 
His death is our life— His life is our gain— 
The joy for the tear ; the peace for the pain ! 

68 



" Now hear these tales, ye weary and worn, 

Who for others do give up your all : 
Our Saviour has told us the seed that would grow 

Into earth's dark bosom must fall, 
And pass from the sight, and die away, 

And then will the fruit appear ; 
The grain that seems lost in the earth below, 

Will return in the manifold ear. 
By death comes life, by life comes gain— 
The joy for the tear ; the peace for the pain !" 



69 



VII, 



"Selah."— Psai,m3:4. 

A text is a selection from Holy Scripture about which is 
woven a religious discourse — a discourse designed to develop and 
enforce the mind of God as expressed in that particular selection 
of Holy Scripture. And the employment of a text as the founda- 
tion of such a discourse is not an innovation of modern times, 
though this is sometimes alleged in disparagement of the practice. 
Every now and then in the history of the Church, there may have 
been a period when it was not the common custom ; but it was no 
strange occurrence in the first years of the Christian Dispensation. 
Preaching the earnest sermon, at the conclusion of which He 
scourged with cords the shy locks of the day out of the Temple, 
Christ had for His text the seventh verse of the fifty-sixth chapter 
of Isaiah : ' ' Mine house shall be called an house of prayer for all 
people." Preaching the Pentecostal sermon, as a consequence of 
which three thousand joined the Church, Peter's text was the 
twenty-eighth verse of the second chapter of Joel : ' ' It shall come 
to pass afterward, that I will pour out My Spirit upon all flesh." 
Preaching the persuasive sermon in the ears of the infuriated 
Council, during the delivery of which his face shone as the face of 
an angel, Stephen's text was the first verse of the twelfth chapter 
of Genesis : " Now the Lord had said unto Abram, Get thee out 
of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father's house, 
unto a land that I will show thee. " Preaching the wonderful 
sermon, under the inspiration of which the Ethiopian nobleman 
accepted Jesus as the Messiah which was to come, and went on his 
way rejoicing, Philip's text was the fourth verse of the fifty- 
third chapter of Isaiah : ' ' Surely He hath borne our griefs, and 
carried our sorrows." 

There is a moral obligation on the preacher of the Word of 
God to expound the text — to display, as far as he can apprehend 
it, the exact thought which the Holy Spirit has deposited within 

70 



it for communication. He may not interpret it aside from its own 
connection, nor press it into the support of a doctrine which it 
does not distinctly convey. It is a sin to preach even the truth 
from a passage which does not embody that truth. It dishonors 
God, impairs the influence of His word, injures the hearer, and 
sows the world with erroneous conceptions of the truth. We may 
have opportunity to develop and enforce only a portion of our 
Scripture selection sometimes ; and sometimes we may employ our 
selection as a motto ; but we must in every case give the inherent 
import of our selection before passing to its use in an accommo- 
dated sense. 

The precise length of a text can not be definitely declared. It 
can not be described as the given measure of so many sentences or 
words. The duty is to take a complete expression of Inspired 
thought. This requires now a chapter or even more, and now a 
paragraph, and now a verse, and now a word : for there are in- 
stances in which a word stands so completely by itself, and teems 
with such a wealth of significance, as to justify the occupancy of 
the whole time of the sermon for the eduction and elucidation of 
its import. 

And Sklah is a word of this character, and entitled to such 
a style of treatment. It occurs in only two of the books incor- 
porated into the sacred canon — seventy- three times in the Psalms, 
and three times in the prophecies of Habakkuk. Morever, it ap- 
pears in every case as a portion of the discourse, or song, in which 
it is found ; and its omission in the Vulgate and some other trans- 
lations is a mutilation of the Inspired text — an unwarranted lib- 
erty with the Inspired volume. The authors of the Authorized 
and Revised Versions of the sacred Scriptures have left it to meet 
English eyes in the original Hebrew. Of course, English readers 
consult their more learned friends as to its meaning ; and of 
course there is a variety in the answers they receive : for the 
learned are not of one judgment in their rendering. 

In all this variety, how T ever, there is agreement that it is a 
musical term. It is a direction or suggestion of the composer as 

71 



to the manner in which the composition shall be rendered so as 
best to accomplish the end of its composition, and to most serve 
the purpose of religious edification and worship. 

It goes without argument that music is an essential element 
in the worship of Jehovah. Discourses are to be delivered, prayers 
are to be offered, and the Scriptures are to be read ; but not 
exclusively. Praise is an equal obligation ; and praise pre-emi- 
nently takes shape in song. The grateful heart must wreathe the 
tongue with doxologies. 

It farther goes without argument in this day that instru- 
mental, as well as vocal music, has its place in the worship of 
Jehovah. The voice may legitimately employ such accompani- 
ment, and find in the accompaniment large assistance and direction 
and inspiration. The Lord of all surely does not ban the use of 
cornet or flute or organ in our Christian sanctuaries : for He 
listened approvingly to cymbal and timbrel and trumpet in the 
Jewish sanctuary; and the seer who looked from Patmos into the 
skies reports that, amid the felicities of the Immortal sanctuary, 
the New Song is sung with harpers harping with their harps. 

Music is a part of the worship of Jehovah in which all the 
worshippers should unite. It is a part belonging to all the people ; 
for all the people have matter and occasion of praise ; and all 
should magnify the Name of the Lord. The sacred oracles call, 
"Let everything that hath breath praise the Lord." And the 
Discipline of Methodism exhorts ' ' every person in the congrega- 
tion to sing, and not one in ten only. " 

Music, in the worship of Jehovah, should be worshipfully 
rendered. Its leaders should be men and women who fear God 
and keep His commandments. It is a shame and sin for the 
Church to borrow its choir from the saloon or the theatre. Its 
hymns and tunes should be in harmony with the occasion and the 
place and the subject. One who spake by Divine commandment 
to the entire Church says, " I will sing with the spirit, and with 
the understanding also." Rules which determine the ways of 
our denomination of the Church write, ' ' Choose such hymns as 

72 



are proper for the occasion : let the tune be suited to the senti- 
ment : let due attention be given to the cultivation of sacred 
music." 

Music calling forth Divine prescription, that it may be accord- 
ing to the proprieties of worship, surely there is need for observ- 
ance of all the proprieties of worship. Holiness becometh the 
house of God ; and there should be no indulgence or toleration of 
indecorum or irreverence in any of its exercises, or in the place 
itself at any time. It is always the house of God. It is always 
for the glory of God, and for the worship of God. And he who 
goes thither for his own entertainment or exhibition has no more 
business there than a pig in a parlor. Surely, if there is to be 
care in the choice of the music, and in the management of the in- 
strument, and in the modulation of the voice, (and all this is 
implied in the word Selah,) everything in the house of the Lord 
should be done decently and in order. If Moses was commanded 
to lay aside his sandals as he approached the burning bush ; if 
Nadab and Abihu were driven to death for bringing strange fire 
into the presence of God ; and if John, amid the glare of Apoca- 
lyptic vision, was overpowered with awe ; we should be careful of 
our manners and of our souls as we enter the place glorious with 
the feet of the High and Lofty One. ' ' Keep thy foot when thou 
goest to the house of God." " O, worship the Lord in the beauty 
of holiness. " " The Lord reigneth : let the people tremble. ' ' 

' ' Let every act of worship be 

Like our espousal, Lord, to Thee : 
Like the blest hour when, from above, 

We first received the pledge of love." 

In the very variety of the interpretations of the word Selah, 
there are suggestions of prime importance and value. By the 
adoption of the Greek word Diapsalma as the equivalent of Selah, 
the authors of the Septuagint version indicate their conviction that 
it is a call to the repetition of what has just been expressed in 
discourse or song or tune. Clearly, then, such repetition is not 
the irreligious or unmeaning exercise some good people assume. 

73 



It frequently adds force and significance to the sentiment ex- 
pressed, and impels it more deeply and permanently into the soul. 
It allows opportunity for consideration of the sentiment until 
there is full feeling and perception of its import ; and thus it 
arrests that thoughtlessness which is so often the bane of our pro- 
fessed worship, and which so often sends us unblessed and unim- 
proved from the sanctuary. It emphasizes the truth uttered until 
it gathers an hundred-fold impressiveness and reaps an hundred- 
fold harvest. A good announcement can scarcely be made too 
many times. Making it the twentieth time, it works out a result 
which it has not previously wrought. 

By Gesenius the word Selah is interpreted as a direction to 
the singers to cease, while the instruments continue to play; and 
so interludes are not necessarily an unholy by-play: they are a 
form of Amen, endorsing the words already spoken, and preparing 
for the words which are to follow. They let the spiritual lips enjoy 
the precious food which has just been tasted, before new dainties 
are served ; and they often rouse the appetite of sinners for the 
luxuries they see regaling the saints. Many an unregenerate 
man, long insensible to argument and exhortation, is irresistibly 
stirred to longing for the feast of fat things by sight of the heav- 
enly bliss sitting upon the faces of the regenerate as they quietly 
feed upon the manna from above. O, ye children of God, your 
very manners may be to the praise of your Father, and constitute 
the tonic of grace to the dying about you. 

By Luther the word is interpreted as a signal for silence — a 
summons to pause and praise and pray and think. An erroneous 
notion obtains that the burden of public and social worship is 
entirely or mainly on its leaders, and that others have merely to 
be recipients of their inspirations and instructions ; but the burden 
is on every one to cultivate himself in grace and in the knowledge 
of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, and to lend a hearty hand 
to the devotion and edification of the assembled company. And, 
instead of encouraging this notion by eccentricities and novelties 
in discourse or music, it would be well ever and anon to suspend 

74 



all discourse and music by the leaders, and let silence reign until 
broken by the cries and groans of those who, calling themselves 
Christians, show no sense of the personal obligations of Christian 
worship. Brothers and sisters, our individual failure to engage 
ourselves devotionally in the services of the sanctuary is the rea- 
son of our individual leanness, and the reason why those services 
are not the power of God unto the salvation of others. No 
service is ever barren to the soul alive unto God. Alive himself 
unto God, he does not know whether discourse or music is good 
according to critical standards, or not. Alive himself unto God, 
he finds God manifesting Himself lovingly and royally unto him, 
and he is in an heavenly place in Christ Jesus. By such seasons 
of silence there might be a lengthening of the period of worship 
occasionally; but no period of worship ought ever to terminate 
until it has won a revelation of God to the waiting man. Every 
period of worship — whether public, private or social — ought to 
last until 

" Heaven comes down our souls to greet, 
And glory crowns the mercy-seat." 

Every clamor for brevity in the worship of God is a sin — a sin of 
which he is never guilty whose heart is right with God. One 
whose heart is right never even thinks of admonishing God to 
hurry through with blessing, or to time revelation by the clock. 
It will be well for us if some day our impertinence and irreverence 
break not out in curses upon our heads : if some day, w T hen we 
hunger for His tarrying, we do not find Him laughing at our 
calamity, and mocking at our fear. The period of worship ought 
to be a period of luxury — a period w 7 e are more loath to have over 
than any banquet or soiree at which we were ever present ; a 
period we ought not to measure by the hour-glass : a period we 
revel in, even if all vocal expression by others be wanting ; a 
period during which we are glad to be relieved of all sound, and 
whisper, " Come then, expressive silence, muse His praise." 

By Rabbi Kimchi, Selah is interpreted as a summons to ele- 
vate the voice. And there is a time for expression, as well as for 

75 



silence in the worship of the God of all grace. We are to make 
mention of His loving-kindness, as well as to think upon His holy 
name. At times, in unspoken meditation upon Him and His 
revelations and right, we may gather fuel for His adoration until 
the fire burns within us ; but if this fire duly burns, there are also 
times when our tongues will be as the pen of a ready writer. 
Those who are alive unto God cannot be always still. Ever and 
anon they cannot but speak the things which they have felt and 
heard and seen. 

" If human kindness meets return, 

And owns the grateful tie ; 
If tender thoughts within us burn 

To feel a friend is nigh ; 
O, shall not warmer accents tell 

The gratitude we owe 
To Him Who died our fears to quell, 

And save from endless woe?" 

It is not comely or dutiful to never bear a part, a lingual part, in 
the devotions of the saints as they proclaim the praise of their 
Saviour. It is not comely or dutiful to merely sit by the fire of 
others, and warm ourselves, without ever throwing a fagot on the 
hearth. It is as uncomely and undutiful to live spiritually at the 
expense of our fellow-members, as it is to let them bear all the 
burden of temporal provision for the house of the Lord. It is as 
uncomely and undutiful to fail in the payment of the one debt, as 
it is to fail in the payment of the other. ' ' Let the word of Christ 
dwell in you richly: teaching and admonishing one another, in 
psalms and hymns and spiritual songs. " " Let the redeemed of 
the Lord say so." li O, bless our God, ye people, and make the 
voice of His praise to be heard : which holdeth our soul in life, 
and sufTereth not our foot to be moved.'' 

By Somer the word is interpreted as an individual ejaculation 
in the midst of the general worship — an Amen or Hallelujah re- 
ported by the lips from some glowing soul which must burst or 
shout. Now it is assent to the decree of the Lord, or confirmation 
of His truth, or deprecation of His judgment. Now it is acknowl- 
edgment of His goodness, or confession of His interposition, or 

76 



declaration of His majesty. Now it is expression of faith, or im- 
portunity for deliverance, or praise for remembrance. Now it is 
exultation in His presence, or prophecy of His reign, or reconse- 
cration to His use. In every instance, it is a spontaneous tribute 
to His Name as the Name which is above every name. That is 
not a becoming or ideal or sufficient worship which serves merely 
for the entertainment of self, or the exhibition of one to another, 
or the glorification of nature, and whose main ends are ends of 
art or morality or reform. Worship God ! Worship God in the 
beauty of holiness. Worship God so exclusively and heartily and 
personally, that every moment and every portion of the service 
shall declare the glory of the King of kings and Lord of lords, 
and that every soul shall show forth the praise of the Saviour and 
Shepherd of our souls. 

By Wucher the w r ord is interpreted as the utterance of one 
saying to himself, "Up my soul ! " Even the godliest, without 
consciousness of delinquency or transgression, occasionally finds 
himself fettered or heavy or wandering in spirit ; or finds himself 
giving way to despondency or inaction ; or finds himself slacking 
up in the pursuit of the eternal and unseen ; and he must not only 
cry for help from the throne of grace, but must also rally himself. 
Indeed, our souls so easily cling to the dust that there is none 
who does not frequently need to chide himself earnestly for his 
earthly-mindedness, and stir himself to self-resurrection, pleading 

" Give me with active warmth to move, 

With vigorous soul to rise ; 
With hands of faith, and wings of love, 

To fly and take the prize." 

" It is good to be always zealously affected in a good thing ; *' for 
the Son of God ' ' gave Himself for us that He might redeem us 
from all iniquity, and purify us unto Himself a peculiar people, 
zealous of good works. ' ' 

By Murphy the word is interpreted as signifying, " There's 
more to follow." Hailing the ear in the announcement of deliver- 
ance, it declares : "This is not all. Listen! There's more to 

77 



follow." Hailing the eye in the discovery of gain, it declares : 
M This is not all. Look ! There's more to follow." Hailing the 
heart in the experience of peace, it declares : " This is not all. 
Trust ! There's more to follow. ' ' 

By the Targums it is interpreted as signifying, eternally; for 
ever and ever ; world without end. 

Nor does this variety of interpretation obscure the word. It 
merely indicates that it is a word of many sides and wondrous 
depths, as the rainbow is a harmonious assemblage of different 
and even dissimilar colors. It merefy lifts it out of the company 
of common words, the import of which you can fathom in an in- 
stant, and places it in the group with those few and select words 
which are charged with sublime significance, and widen with 
every effort for their comprehension or description — words which 
demand both time and eternity for their understanding. 

A fathomless and limitless expanse of being and bliss thus 
opens out to the raptured vision of him who worships God in 
spirit and in truth. Bowed exultingly in the communion of the 
saints, there's more to follow. Glad in the fellowship of those 
who dwell in the house of the Lord, there's more to follow. Happy 
in the discourses and meditations and offerings and prayers and 
songs of those who joy in God, there's more to follow. Pressing 
forward in the peace that passeth understanding, there's more to 
follow. Rejoicing in the love of God, shed abroad in your hearts 
by the Holy Spirit given unto you, there's more to follow. An 
immense fortune is deposited with a minister for one of his parish- 
ioners who is in very straitened circumstances. Apprehensive, 
from his knowledge of him, that the beneficiary might waste his 
means if entrusted entirely and immediately with the whole sum, 
the minister gives him a little at a time . saying, with each instal- 
ment, " This is yours ; employ it wisely; there's more to follow." 
And thus, follower of Christ and heir of God, is it with the good- 
ness laid up for you. It is an inheritance incorruptible, and un- 
dented, and that fadeth not away. There is to it neither end nor 
measure. It is given you, however, not all at once, nor uncondi- 

78 



tionally, but day by day; and yet, regularly and surely, day by 
day, 3'ou have given you enough for the day; and it will be given 
you, every day, as you have need, through all succeeding days. 
O, how great is the goodness which God has laid up for those who 
fear Him, and trust in Him before the sons of men ! 

Go, live on the portion given you. Fear no failure in the 
remittance of the more than royal bounty: there's more to follow. 
Fear no exhaustion of the supply: there's more to follow. Let 
no apprehension of the withdrawal of the stores of Divine grace 
chill your heart, or darken your sky, or sit as a spectre at your 
feast of fat things : there's more to follow. " My God shall supply 
all your need, according to His riches in glory, by Christ Jesus." 
4 ' The Lord God is a sun and shield ; the Lord will give grace 
and glory; no good thing will He withhold from them that walk 
uprightly." And eternally, for ever and ever, and world without 
end, there's more to follow ! 

You who are intellectually convinced of the excellence and 
truth of the glorious Gospel of the blessed God, but who have not 
experienced it to be the power of God unto your salvation, O, taste 
and see that the Lord is good : for, still there's more to follow ; 
and if any man will do His will, he shall know of the doctrine, 
whether it be of God. You who are just come into the gladness 
of forgiven sin and a new nature, stand fast in the liberty where- 
with Christ has made you free : for still there's more to follow ; 
and then shall you know, if you follow on to know the Lord. 
You who for many years are joying in the God of your salvation, 
hold that fast which you have, that no man take your crown : for 
still there's more to follow ; and eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, 
nor heart imagined, the things which God hath prepared for them 
that love Him. You who, long growing in grace and in the 
knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, are about finish- 
ing your pilgrimage and going in among immortal beatitudes, be 
faithful unto death : for still there's more to follow ; and there 
remaineth a rest to the people of God. You, who lately are gone 
over the intervening river, and upon whose ravished faces the 

79 



bliss of the ransomed has just dawned, give goodly greeting to 
Hirn who hath made you meet to be partakers of the saints in 
light : for still there's more to follow; and they who go in go out no 
more for ever. You who for myriads of ages are drinking of the 
river of water of life, and having that dower of joy which ever grows 
to higher joy, pass on from grace to grace, and from glory to 
glory : for still there's more to follow ; and as ye pass from joy to 
joy, sing songs of holy ecstasy which, caught by our ears, shall 
stir our feet to walk the ways you trod, until, standing by your 
side, we shall sing with you, " Unto Him that is able to do ex- 
ceeding abundantly above all that we can ask, or think, according 
to the power that worketh in us, unto Him be glory in the 
Church, by Christ Jesus, throughout all ages, world without end. 
Amen." 



80 



VIII. 

11 These things write I unto thee, hoping to come unto thee shortly: 
But if I tarry long, that thou mayest know how thou oughtest to behave 
thyself in the house of God, which is the church of the living God, the 
pillar and ground of the truth. And without controversy great is the mys- 
tery of godliness: God was manifest in the flesh, justified in the Spirit, 
seen of angels, preached unto the Gentiles, believed on in the world, re- 
ceived up into glory."— I. Timothy, 3 : 14-16. 

A young man, Timothy, is in Ephesus, charged with the 
supervision of the few in that city who have embraced the truth 
as it is in Jesus. As a matter of course, his administration and 
carriage will largely determine the character and fortune of the 
church of which he is overseer. The bearing of every individual, 
however humble, whether layman or officer, has much to do with 
the credit and efficiency of any society with which he is identified. 

The apostle Paul has a deep interest in this company of 
Christians, and in its j^outhful pastor : coveting for both signal 
prosperity, and hoping, in the near future, to bestow and experi- 
ence the refreshment of personal intercourse. But, lest he shall be 
disappointed in his expectation of the visit, he writes Timothy this 
letter — declaring his affection, and directing him as to his conduct 
in the discharge of his ministry to that little band of believers in 
Immanuel amid countless crowds of idolaters. In the paragraph 
of the letter now in consideration, attempting to impress Timothy 
with the magnitude of his responsibilities, in several suggestive 
metaphors he incidentally sets forth the character of the Christian 
Church. 

It is the Church of thk Living God. A church is, pri- 
marily, an assembly of persons for the consideration of any sub- 
ject, either sacred or secular. Even when first incorporated into 
the English language as the designation of a religious assembly, 
the word describes not only a congregation of Christians, but any 
congregation of worshippers, no matter of what creed or rite. But 
it has come to denote, particularly, the whole body of persons 
who, believing in the God of the Scriptures, are changed into His 

81 



image, enjoy His favor, and give themselves to His service and 
worship. 

He is the Living God. He is not merely an abstraction, or an 
attribute, or a force, or a law, or a mode. He is not merely an all- 
embracing essence, of which all other essence is the expression or 
outcome. He is not merely, as is taught by Spinoza, an un- 
creating, unthinking, universal substance, to which belongs 
everything else, whether perceptible or imperceptible. He is not 
merely an imagination, like that Diana to which Ephesus has 
erected its stupendous temple and in whose honor its citizens have 
shouted themselves hoarse. He is the Living God — the God Who 
has in Himself unbeginning and unending life ; the God Whose 
life is infinite in its resources of intelligence and happiness and 
supremacy; the God Whose life is the inspiration and rule and 
sufficiency of all other life. 

The Christian Church is the Church of the Living God. He 
has bought it with His own blood. He walks in the midst of its 
seven golden candlesticks, with its seven stars in His right hand, 
clothed with a garment down to the foot, and girt about the paps 
with a golden girdle, His head and His hairs white like wool, as 
white as snow, — and His eyes as a flame of fire, His feet like unto 
fine brass, His voice as the sound of many waters, and His counte- 
nance as the sun shining in his strength. 

" Stand vip and bless the Lord, 

Ye people of His choice ; 
Stand up and bless the Lord your God, 

With heart and soul and voice. 

" Though high above all praise, 

Above all blessing high, 
"Who would not fear His Holy Name, 

And laud and magnify?" 

IT is the House of God. Another representation of the 
Church now hails our attention. It is no longer a mere aggregate 
of individual worshippers, but a magnificent and massive edifice 
builded out of them that believe. 

Heaven is called the House of God. ' ' In My Father's house 
are many mansions. ' ' The Tabernacle carried by Israel in the 

82 



journey from Egypt to Canaan is called the House of God. Han- 
nah took Samuel ' ' and brought him unto the house of the Lord 
in Shiloh. " The Temple in Jerusalem is called the House of God. 
** Mine house shall be called an house of prayer for all people." 

And those who hold the faith of the New Testament, under 
that Testament now constitute the House of God. " Now, there- 
fore, ye are no more strangers and foreigners, but fellow-citizens 
with the saints, and of the household of God ; And are built upon 
the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ Himself 
being the chief corner-stone ; In Whom all the building fitly 
framed together groweth unto an holy temple in the Lord : In 
Whom ye also are build ed together for an habitation of God 
through the Spirit. ' ' 

They are the House of God because He hath builded it. 
' Ye are God's husbandry, ye are God's building." '* Ye are a 
chosen generation; a royal priesthood, an holy nation, a peculiar 
people ; that ye should shew forth the praises of Him who hath 
called you out of darkness into His marvellous light : which in 
time past w r ere not a people, but are now the people of God : 
which had not obtained mercy, but now 7 have obtained mercy." 

They are the House of God because He has furnished it. 
" Even as Christ also loved the Church, and gave Himself for it ; 
that He might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water 
by the word, that He might present it to Himself a glorious 
Church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing ; but that 
it should be holy and without blemish. ' ' 

And they are the House of God because He inhabits it. 
"For ye are the temple of the Living God; as God hath said, I 
will dwell in them, and walk in them ; and I will be their God, 
and they shall be My people. ' ' 

" Zion, shout thy Lord and King, 

Israel's Holy One is He ! 
Give Him thanks, rejoice and sing, 

Great is He, and dwells in thee. 
O, the grace unsearchable ! 

While eternal ages roll, 
God delights in man to dwell, 

Soul of each believing soul." 

83 



It Is the Ground of the Truth. Again there is a 
shifting of the scenery, and the Church appears as a broad, deep, 
strong foundation ; and on this foundation is seen resting all that 
is of supreme importance to the sons and daughters of humanity. 
For, in no insignificant measure, the Church is the inspiration and 
occasion of every benediction which enriches and illuminates 
human life. It is the spring from which largely pours forth all 
that is beautiful and good and permanent in humanity's lot. 

If you remove from the world what has come to it from 
Christianity, in art, and history, and law, and politics, and sci- 
ence, how trifling is the remainder ! If 3^ou take away the con- 
tributions of Christianity to the world in charity, and commerce, 
and education, and morals, and society, what have you left ? If 
you compare the countries which are pervaded with the spirit of 
the Gospel with countries which are under Atheistic, or Pagan 
domination, how patent the contrast ! There are the first all 
aglow with peace and plenty and progress ; and there are the last 
all hung with the shadows of ignorance and misery and vice. 
There are the first all blooming and fragrant and fruitful, as a 
garden of the Divine planting ; and there are the last all blasted 
and desolate and sterile, as a wilderness of Satanic misrule. 

It is, however, as the deposit of things which bear on man's 
relations to God, to others, and to himself, that the Church is 
particularly the ground of the truth. The oracles of the truth 
are in her hands. Its redemption is on her altars. Its teachings 
move her lips. To her feet the nations make their pilgrimage as 
they cry, " Come, and let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, 
and to the house of the God of Jacob; and He will teach us of 
His ways, and we will walk in His paths ; for out of Zion shall 
go forth the law, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem." 

It is admitted that many a cloud has gathered above, and 
many a wave has rushed against this foundation. Argument and 
persecution and wit have each exhausted all its resources, and 
hurled all its shafts, in the mad antagonism. Earth and hell 
have joined hands in the unholy and unrelenting crusade. Never- 

84 



theless, there stands the foundation still, as fair and whole as 
when it first was laid — not a crack in its side, nor a dint in its 
surface. ' ' God is in the midst of her ; she shall not be moved : 
God shall help her, and that right early." 

" O, where are kings and empires now, 

Of old that went and came ? 
But, Lord, Thy Church is praying yet, 

A thousand years the same. 
Unshaken as eternal hills, 

Immovable she stands, 
A mountain that shall fill the earth, 

A house not made with hands." 

It is the Pillar of the Truth. Again the curtain lifts, 
after having fallen upon the exhibition of the Church as the 
foundation of the truth ; as the ark and fortress of the revelation 
given of God for the enlightenment and renewal of humanity; as 
under imperative obligation to careful custody of the hallowed 
deposit ; and as having, through all the shocks of battle and of 
storm, kept the faith once delivered to the saints ; — and now a 
stately, towering pillar is on the stage. 

A pillar is for perpetuation and publication. In all ages and 
climes it has been in use for inscriptions deemed particularly 
worthy of general and lasting observation and transmission. 

Always has truth been in existence ; for truth is the mind of 
the everlasting God. It came into the world cotemporaneously 
with the world's capacity and necessity. It has been lodged in a 
becoming depository. It has been duly guarded and preserved. 
Neither force nor fraud has achieved its theft. There it is in all 
its integrity and purity. Yet, for ages it has been under lock 
and key. It has been largely a mystery. And truth in bonds 
and shadows is but of limited value. However safe from assault 
and robbery, while a mystery it is largely shorn of its worth. 
The accomplishment of its mission requires its dissemination, as 
well as its preservation. But the world, severed from the Divine 
image and love, feels no interest in its dissemination. Fettered 
with Satanic manacles, it would rather conceal or destroy all 
knowledge of God and godly things. It is unwilling to let loose 

85 



light, because it loves the darkness rather than light. 

Finally, however, the fulness of time has come ; and the 
Church rises aloft, amid the surrounding mists and oppositions, 
the herald of God. The mystery of Godliness is a mystery no 
longer. The advent of the Messiah is no longer only the dream 
of burdened ages, or the hope of weary saints, or the hidden 
kernel of prophecies and types. Yonder, above the summit of 
the mountain, beyond the clouds, within the range of every will- 
ing eye, wrought immovably into the enduring granite under- 
neath, towers the splendid shaft. 

"In the cross of Christ I glory, 

Towering o'er the wrecks of time : 
All the light of sacred story 

Gathers round its head sublime " 

It Is a Pillar Hexagon in Shape. It has six sides. On 
these several sides, in luminous lines, is graven an abridgment of 
the glorious Gospel of the blessed God — an epitome of the mys- 
tery of Godliness : a summary of the truth of which the Church 
is the ground and pillar. 

Rooking successively at the several sides of this pillar, we see 
the mystery of Godliness gleaming with radiance, and we come to 
a knowledge of the truth as it is in Jesus. 

On the first side is written, " God is manifest in the flesh." 
Deity and humanity are blended into one Personality. Deity and 
humanity have entered into a union which is never to know dis- 
solution. Jehovah incarnates Himself in man ; by the oblation 
of Himself magnifies His dishonored law ; rises from the grave 
in demonstration of the perfection of the atonement He has made ; 
and, henceforth, for ever wears man's form as the medium of His 
intercourse with the ransomed of the sons of men, and as a 
trophy of the triumph He has won in contest with the powers of 
darkness. "The Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, 
and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the 
Father, full of grace and truth." 

On the second side is written, "Is justified in the Spirit " If 



the term Spirit here indicates His own higher nature, in distinc- 
tion from His inferior nature, then it declares that He carries 
Himself sublimely. His personal character is blameless. His 
execution of the Messianic office is beyond reproach. He fulfils 
all righteousness. There is no fault in Him. If the term indi- 
cates the third Person of Divine Being, then it declares that He 
is justified in all His announcements and claims, by the descent 
of the Spirit upon Him at the time of His baptism ; by the in- 
tervention of the Spirit in His resurrection, declaring Him to be 
the Son of God with power ; by the manifestation of the Spirit, 
in harmony with His previous promise, to His disciples on the 
day of Pentecost ; by the potency of the Spirit in the prosperity 
of His word in that whereto He sends it ; and by the witness of 
His Spirit with the spirits of those who believe on Him to the 
salvation of their souls. ' ' For ye have not received the spirit of 
bondage again to fear ; but ye have received the Spirit of adop- 
tion, whereby we cry, Abba, Father." 

On the third side is written, " Is seen of angels." He is the 
cynosure of celestial eyes, and the object of celestial interest and 
study. Supernal attendants announce His advent, greet His birth, 
keep Him company in the wilderness, minister refreshment to Him 
m Gethsemane, mount guard at His grave, report His resurrection , 
throng His upward path from Olivet to Heaven, and watch with 
earnest gaze all the revealments of His grace in the redemption of 
lapsed humanity : ' ' things which the angels desire to look into. ' ' 

On the fourth side is written, ''Is preached unto the Gentiles" 
Judaism assumes a monopoly of the Messiah. Paganism breathes 
its benedictions on the elite among its devotees. Philosophy calls 
only to a little, select company with its offers of elevation. Only 
the mystery of Godliness essays the discovery of its treasures to 
humanity in all its conditions and grades. Only the truth as it is 
in Jesus proposes to take in every child of man. " Go ye, there- 
fore, into all the world, and preach the Gospel to every creature." 

On the fifth side is written, " Is believed on in the world" 
Coming to challenge the homage of the world, He appears witk- 

87 



out form or comeliness. He is a Man of sorrows. He has not 
where to lay His head. No impressive insignia pioneer His way. 
His teachings are in antagonism to all carnal desires and hopes 
and inclinations. Those whom He summons are apprized that 
they risk contempt and death and infamy. Whatever of fame or 
influence He attracts seems to be unsought and, in some sense, 
without His wish ; for He is unwilling to be publicly recognized 
as the Messiah by the excitable and thoughtless populace. Yet, 
He is today the mightiest force in human history or society. 
The best and wisest of the race are students of His character and 
mission. The eye and ear and heart of mankind are largely His. 
The millions crown Him Lord of all. The tide is turning increas- 
ingly to His footstool. " The God of the whole earth shall He 
be called." 

On the sixth side is written, " Is received up into glory \" In 
glory He cleaves the glowing skies, at the close of His personal 
ministry among men. In gloty He takes the highest seat that 
Heaven affords. In glory he gathers all generations, from the 
beginning to the end of time, to the bar of irreversible judgment. 
In glory He binds His foes in chains beyond all breaking. In 
glory He flings open His own matchless mansions for an inalien- 
able homestead of His friends. And in glory He is throned for 
all the cycles of immortal being, ' ' so that two whole and perfect 
natures, that is to say the Godhead and Manhood, are joined 
together in one Person, never to be divided, whereof is One 
Christ, very God, and very Man." " Wherefore God hath highly 
exalted Him, and given Him a Name which is above every name, 
that at the Name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in 
heaven, and things on earth, and things under the earth : and 
that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the 
glory of God the Father." 

" Hail, Prince of Life, for ever hail ! 
Redeemer, Brother, Friend ! 
Though earth and time and life shall fail, 
Thy praise shall never end." 

An opinion obtains among some authorities that the magnifi- 

88 



cent abstract of the Gospel thus standing forth in illuminated col- 
ors upon the pillar of our study, is a stanza of an early Christian 
hymn ; and that, writing of the honor and responsibility of mem- 
bership in the Church of Jesus Christ, the teeming lines leap to 
the lips of the rapt Apostle : 

" Manifested in the flesh, 
Justified in the Spirit, 

Seen of angels, 
Preached among the Gentiles, 
Believed on in the world, 

Taken up in glory." 

Conning, as a sweet morsel, the glowing words, he recalls an 
exciting scene of which he was once a witness in Ephesus, to the 
youthful pastor of the Christian Church in that city, to whom he 
is addressing his present letter — that momentous crisis in his life 
when, irritated beyond measure with his denunciation of their 
idolatry, and his proclamation of Jesus Christ as King of kings 
and Lord of lords, an angry mob howled, " Great is Diana of the 
Kphesians ! " 

Recalling this ever memorable scene, he sings, " Great is the 
mystery of Godliness : God was manifest in the flesh, justified in 
the Spirit, seen of angels, preached unto the Gentiles, believed on 
in the world, received up into glory. — O, Timothy, I well recollect 
the infatuation of the Ephesians, among whom you minister, 
with a lifeless, soulless deity; I well recollect how they endeavored 
to silence my story of Jesus and the Resurrection with their insane 
shout, ' Great is our Diana ! ' Preach louder than ever, ' With- 
out controversy, great is the mystery of Godliness which is made 
known in the Eamb of God that taketh away the sin of the 
world.' Tell them, if they want something great and wortlty in 
which to boast, and over which to shout, here it is : the Mystery of 
Godliness! Here is something great — great in conception, great 
in execution, great in import, great in reach, great in result, great 
in contrast with the worship of Diana as the worship of God in 
contrast with the worship of a worm. Tell them, Here is the 
glorious Gospel of the blessed God ; here is God, in Christ, recon- 
ciling the world unto Himself. ' ' 

89 



Verily, it is no wonder that, in the presence of this illustrious 
mystery, and in the presence of the conviction that the Christian 
Church is the pillar and ground of the truth, the educated, logi- 
cal, polished, sedate, and self -suppressed pupil of Gamaliel, saved 
with the power of endless life, goes into ecstasy and his lips get to 
naming with the Hallelujahs of his soul. 

Verily, we have no need to apologize for our connection with 
the Christian Church. It is the grandest institution in the world 
today. It is the tabernacle of God among men. It is the Church 
of the Living God. It is the House of God. It is the Ground 
of the Truth. It is the Pillar of the Mystery of Godliness. It 
ought to be our heartiest glory and joy; for a place at its altars is 
the highest dignity and the supremest wealth within human reach 
until, sweeping in through the gates of pearl, washed in the blood 
of the Lamb, we hand in our certificates to the General Assembly 
and Church of the Firstborn which are written in Heaven. 

Verily, let our chief concern be that we burden not the 
Church with any necessity to apologize for allowing our presence 
at its hallowed altars. Let us walk worthy of the high vocation 
wherewith we are called. Let each of us be a church of the Liv- 
ing God, a good man, full of faith and of the Hofy Ghost. Let 
each of us be a house of God, Christ within us the hope of glory. 
Let each of us be a ground of the Mystery of Godliness, steadfast, 
immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord. Let each 
of us be a pillar of the Truth, erect and unscathed amid all the 
antagonisms of earth and all the assaults of hell — a light-house, 
letting our light so shine before men that they may see our good 
works, and glorify our Father which is in Heaven : a miniature of 
Christ, always, like Him, going about doing good, and leaving 
footprints on the sands of time, stepping into which our suc- 
cessors, through following generations, shall walk even as He 
walked — 

" Footprints which perhaps another, 

Sailing o'er Life's solemn main, 
A forlorn and ship-wrecked brother, 

Seeing, shall take heart again." 

90 



IX. 

" I do set My bow in the cloud, and it shall be for a token of a cove- 
nant between Me and the earth."— Genesis, 9 : 13. 

The threatened deluge has come, achieved its mission of 
destruction, and withdrawn its desolating waters from off the face 
of the land. Thoroughly assured that the billows of death are 
stayed, Noah ana his family have passed out of the ark within 
which they have been imprisoned for anxious, weary months. 
Appropriately, their first acts, after the termination of their cap- 
tivity, are the erection of an altar and the offering of sacrifice — 
acts expressing their gratitude, and proclaiming their trust. 

These utterances of devotion and praise are graciously 
accepted by the Infinite Sovereign, and occasion His announce- 
ment that humanity shall never suffer another such curse : that 
henceforth, during the present constitution of things, seed-time 
and harvest shall never fail. He then reiterates, in the interest 
of Noah and his sons, the blessing originally pronounced on Adam 
and Eve ; renews the human right to dominion over the inferior 
animals ; allows man the use of flesh, as well as fruits and grains, 
for food ; delegates to society the authority to inflict death as the 
penalty of murder ; and sends the solitary family forth to the 
repopulation of the wasted world. 

Standing amid such surroundings — commissioned, after such 
experiences, to commence life again, what must have been the 
feelings and thoughts of the little band so recently rescued from 
the verge of death ! What conviction of the exceeding sinfulness 
of sin ! What a sense of the danger of disobedience to God ! 
What consciousness of their indebtedness to Divine mercy ! 
What sentiments of gratitude to Supreme Goodness ! What pur- 
poses of consecration to the service of Him Whose kingdom ruleth 
over all ! What fear lest similar judgments should hurtle through 
the sky ! And, notwithstanding the recent Divine assurance, 
how this last apprehension subdues all other feelings and thoughts, 
and paralyzes all other convictions and purposes ! 

91 



To lift the oppressive pall, and to impart the inspiration 
requisite to the accomplishment of the errand of their preserva- 
tion, Jehovah enters into a special covenant with the trembling 
remnant of the race of Adam. A covenant is an agreement 
between two parties, binding each to the fulfilment of certain obli- 
gations, and securing to each certain rights. In the sacrifice 
offered on emergence from the ark, the rescued family has bound 
itself to the service of the L,ord of all ; and He now binds Himself 
to its continuance and prosperity. Directly and visibly, this cove- 
nant is a guarantee against one form of disaster — a second anni- 
hilation of the race by a deluge ; but it clearly includes and reit- 
erates all the benedictions proposed to the race from the com- 
mencement of its history. 

This covenant is in the interest of the descendants of those 
with whom it is originally made. It embraces their seed. It em- 
braces us and ours — our inheritance of its provisions being condi- 
tioned upon our observance of the terms in consideration of which 
its immunities were secured to our ancestors. Long as Omni- 
science discerns our presence before the altar, and our offering of 
sacrifice, so long will Omnipotence observe the Divine engage- 
ment for our well-being. 

And this covenant is in the interest of the inferior animals. 
It affects favorably every living thing. It promises life, suste- 
nance and weal, uninterrupted by universal catastrophe, to men 
and all subordinate creatures, throughout the whole period or- 
dained for man's continuance amid terrestrial conditions. 

This covenant with Noah is not simply an interesting record 
of days long gone by. It is not simply a relic to be fondled by 
the antiquarian. It is the charter of our life and happiness. Our 
very selves plead with us to stand by the solemn contract. The 
very beasts and fowls urge that we hold to the dower which is 
worth so much to them as well as to us. 

In every eye there gleams Jehovah's security for the fulfil- 
ment of His portion of the compact. Perhaps, even during the 
interview, the clouds gather and the showers drop themselves on 

92 



the bosom of the earth. Noah and his sons startle at memories of 
other days. It was thus that the great waste of waters began 
which issued in such fearful havoc. They can not banish or con- 
ceal their uneasiness. It depicts itself in every feature of the 
face, and in every movement of the body. And the indulgent 
God sees their alarm and pities their trepidation. He stations 
them with their backs to the sun, fixing their gaze in an opposite 
direction upon the descending rain. He shows them the rainbow, 
caused by the rays of the sun shining through the falling drops 
upon the heavier cloud behind, and says, "I do set My bow in 
the cloud, and it shall be for a token of a covenant between Me 
and the earth. And it shall come to pass, when I bring a cloud 
over the earth, that the bow shall be seen in the cloud : And I 
will remember My covenant, which is between Me and you and 
every living creature of all flesh ; and the waters shall no more 
become a flood to destroy all flesh. And the bow shall be in the 
cloud ; and I will look upon it, that I may remember the ever- 
lasting covenant between God and every living creature of all 
flesh that is upon the earth." 

The rainbow comes of the reflection of the rays of the sun 
from the descending drops of rain at a given angle to the eye of 
the observer. It is a variegated arch of reflected and refracted 
light. It is a demonstration that the clouds have not entirely 
driven the sun from the heavens, and that the sun is still shining 
somewhere. 

Of course, the rainbow was not just then created, when 
Jehovah called the attention of Noah and his sons to it as the 
token of His covenant. It has appeared ever since the ordination 
of the present laws of the atmosphere and light, whenever the 
eye, the cloud and the sun have been in suitable relations to each 
other. The Hebrew of our text, strictly rendered, is, " My bow 
have I given in the cloud " — you see it now stretching across the 
sky. You have often seen it before. Henceforth it is to wear a 
new significance. After this it is to stand out, not only as a thing 
of beauty, but as a joy for ever. It shall be a token of a cove- 

93 



nant between Me and the land. Ever hence, when it shall move 
into 3 r our vision, remember, in the face of all fears and forebod- 
ings, that you have My assurance that the sea will never again 
dispossess the earth — that each, till time be no more, shall main- 
tain its proper relation to the other, and that no illimitable ruin 
shall subvert the conditions of human existence. 

The ring is not a new creation; but it speaks a new language 
as the husband places it upon the finger of his wife. Water is 
not a new creation ; but it expresses a new idea as, sprinkled on 
the brow, it opens the door of the Church. Bread is not a new 
creation ; but it feeds me as never before when I eat it as the 
symbol of the broken body of my Redeemer. The cross is not a 
new creation ; but there attaches to it a new interest as I see the 
Son of God dying in its rugged arms as my Saviour. And the 
rainbow is not a new creation. It is an old phenomenon. But 
it is richer and sweeter than the freshest and rarest novelty, as I 
understand that He whose truth endureth for ever has baptized it 
as the pledge that His mercy shall be co-eternal with His truth. 

The beaut}' of the rainbow is not its only charm or worth. 
It is an object of attraction and admiration as it spans the sky. 
Fiction and poetry have ample w r arrant for all the songs they sing 
in its honor. The man, as well as the child, must gaze entranced 
upon the brilliant arch. It is no wonder that the ancient 
Hebrews thought it the band binding earth and Heaven together. 

" Bridge of enchantment, for a moment hung 
Between the tears of earth and smiles of Heaven, 

Surely the sheen of jasper, sapphire, gold, 
Flashes and burns along thy colors seven, 

And to the lifted heart, the beaming eye 

Reveals the splendor of the upper sky. 

" Whether as Northmen dream, the hero's soul 

Enters its rest across thy brilliant height, 
Or as the more melodious Greek hath told, 

Iris descends with message of delight, 
Or in the silence beautiful is heard 
The still, small whisper of the Hebrew word : 



94 



" Welcome for ever to a stormy world ! 

Dear in each sign and symbol of the past 
As of the future ; for our Hope shall climb 

Thy lustrous arch to realms unseen and vast. 
Peace shall come down to us, and in thy light 
God's finger still the golden promise write !" 

It is also of inestimable value as a reminder that God is 
merciful toward the children of men. First appearances may 
sometimes indicate severity upon His part ; but He ever thinketh 
thoughts of mercy toward the needy. The storm is only the 
shifting of scenery for the advent of the rainbow. 

And it is of inestimable value as a reminder that God is 
mindful of His engagement. Sir William Napier, finding a child 
crying over a broken bowl, promised her the means to replace it 
if she would meet him the next day ; and he kept that appoint- 
ment with a little waif of the streets, though, when its time came, 
it kept him from a lordly party. Yon rainbow is an enlarged and 
illuminated and perpetuated representation of God's averment, as 
the deluge abated, " I do set My bow in the cloud, and it shall be 
for a token of a covenant between Me and the earth ; ' ' and God 
is never false, though our impatience sometimes imagines He is. 

And it is, further, of inestimable value as a reminder that 
God is our God. The promise is to the children, as well as to the 
fathers. We are legatees of this ancient will. Love and service 
entitle us, through Christ, to a large share in the fulness of God. 
The ark opens to furnish safety. The rainbow glows to furnish 
a guarantee of bliss without measure or end. 

Its value is thus great and inestimable as a reminder that God 
never forgets those who commit themselves to His keeping in 
well-doing. Shadows may increase, and storms may gather, but 
no deluge will overflow us. No weapon will prosper to our de- 
struction. His eye is on our necessity. He bears us on His 
heart. 

Two friends, when separating from each other, fixed upon a 
certain star and agreed that in time to come, as they should look 
upon that star, they would think each of the other ; and thence- 

95 



forth the star was a sign to each of the thought of the other. A 
mother and son, parting, engaged to pray for each other at sun- 
set ; and thereafter the sunset was to each the sign of the continu- 
ing prayer of the other. And so thou, when thou seest God's 
bow in the cloud, think of God : for He is thinking of thee. A 
little boy, to whom a gentleman explained the significance of the 
rainbow, concerning the promise of God to bestow blessings on 
those who trust in Him, took it in pure faith as the Divine sign 
to himself. And thereafter, whenever he saw the 1>ow in the 
cloud, he thought of God as signaling to him the compact made 
between them, and renewed his promise to the Father in Heaven 
that he would be a good boy. So should we regard it, not only as 
a sign to the whole world, but especially as a sign to ourselves 
individually, and renew our promises of faithfulness to Him who 
is ever faithful to us. 

" Triumphal arch, that fillest the sky 

When storms prepare to part, 
I ask not proud Philosophy 

To teach me what thou art. 
Still seem, as to my childhood's sight, 

A midway station given 
For happy spirits to alight 

Betwixt the earth and Heaven. 
How glorious is thy girdle, cast 

O'er mountain, tower and town, 
Or mirrored in the ocean vast, 

A thousand fathoms down. 
As fresh in yon horizon dark, 

As young thy beauties seem, 
As when the eagle from the ark 

First sported in thy beam : 
For, faithful to its sacred page, 

Heaven still rebuilds the span. 
Nor lets the type grew pale with age 

Which first spoke ptace to ir,an." 



96 



X, 



" I bear in my body the marks of the Lord Jesus." — GaIvA.Tia.ns, 6 : 17. 

A life of aggressive, consistent, resolute faith in the Son of 
God is not an easy, quiet life. It has abundant compensations, 
and is full of inspiring and sustaining motives ; but it knows the 
cloudy hour and the rugged road. 

And Satan is not its only adversary, nor the world its only 
antagonism. Frequently, its enemies are of its own household — 
its foes those whom kindred creed and danger and hope should 
bind together in strongest and sweetest fellowship. Too often the 
members of the visible body of Christ assault the character, mis- 
construe the intentions, and spoil the peace, of each other. 

And the greatest and noblest of the brotherhood is no excep- 
tion to the bitter experience. As Paul is contending for the faith, 
and endeavoring to have the Church without spot or wrinkle or 
any such thing, his call to the Apostolic office is called in ques- 
tion, and his right to represent the Founder of the Christian 
religion is debated and denied. 

Declaring, in this letter to the Galatians, his mission and pre- 
rogatives, he dismisses the discussion with an earnest, tender 
solicitation : ' ' From henceforth let no man trouble me : for I bear 
in my body the marks of the Lord Jesus. ' ' 

Marks are scars branded by a master on the body of a slave, 
as signs of the ownership of the one and of the subjection of the 
other. Some authorities allege that this same custom has obtained 
among some peoples for the designation of their soldiers ; and 
that idolaters sometimes burn on themselves the name of their god, 
as an evidence of their devotion, and as a means of safety. Paul, 
you remember, sometimes speaks of himself as a servant of Jesus 
Christ, sometimes as a soldier, and sometimes as a worshipper. So 
here he cries, Henceforth let no man dispute or doubt my relation- 
ship to Jesus Christ. I belong to Him. Is He Master? I am 
His servant. Is He God ? I am His worshipper. Is He Cap- 

97 



tain ? I am His soldier. I bear in my body His marks. These 
wales are the scars of scourges I have received for carrying His 
colors. 

Association with influential personages is always more or less 
impressive. Ages ago it became a proverb that, " He that walk- 
eth with wise men shall be wise : but the companion of fools shall 
be destroyed." Both for good and for ill, we are affected by those 
with whom we are much in intercourse. Even though not com- 
mitted or practised in our immediate presence, both great crimes 
and great virtues impress themselves as indisputably as the flower- 
garden, while it is yet invisible, reports itself by its fragrance. It 
is a life-long experience that character attracts and colors char- 
acter, not only directly and openly, but by methods defying all 
human analysis and perception. 

. English history informs us that it was once an English faith 
that the touch of a king was a cure for scrofula. Even today it is 
the faith of some that the conjuration of a powwow can effect the 
healing of disease. But, though this is falsehood or fancy, it is 
neither falsehood nor fane}' that strong natures mould and wield 
weaker natures. A glance of Napoleon's e}^e can fire a French 
boy until he must be a soldier ; and a motion of his hand from 
the summit of a distant hill can recall his flying legions to the 
field. Once the stars seem to fight against Ferdinand. His au- 
thority and fortune are on the wane. Neither his bounties nor his 
promises can gather the necessary armies. Gonsalvo espouses his 
cause ; and men from every class rush to the standard of the gal- 
lant and generous captain, until it looks as if Spain is one immense 
camp. Hardly a cavalier is left at home ; and many expend their 
all that they may equip themselves in suitable style. Howard, 
in his philanthropic walks through the English hospitals and 
prisons, does more than carry comfort and healing to their suffer- 
ing inmates. He formulates benevolence into a fashion. He 
kindles charity into a science. He lifts England out of its selfish- 
ness, and turns on humanit}' a stream of kindness which is now 
washing every shore. Sheridan meets his panic-stricken comrades 

98 



running like frightened hares, summons them to follow him back 
to the enemy, and transforms the defeat of Cedar Creek into one 
of the brightest triumphs of the war. Henry Clay, in 1848, is the 
guest of New Orleans. The largest hall in the city is crowded for 
his reception. Through the long address of welcome by Governor 
Moulton, one man never sees or hears the Governor. He never 
moves his eyes from Clay. When the exercises are over, he says 
to a friend of mine standing beside him, " Stranger, I never saw 
him before. I have ridden thirty miles today to see him. I would 
have given my plantation and sold my slaves sooner than not have 
seen him. I think he is the greatest man that ever lived. O, if 
he don't go to Heaven, I don't think I want to go." 

Every page of biography blazes with the power of personality. 
All of us are today what we are largely because of the influence of 
others — an influence of which at the time giver and recipient were 
unconscious. Sometimes the influence drew down. Sometimes 
it lifted up. Sometimes it was a blessing. Sometimes it was a 
curse. Still, whether for weal or w r oe, it has entered into our 
present make-up — it is part of ourselves for ever. 

Association with Jesus Christ is signally impressive. At this 
juncture I consider Him only as a man. I claim nothing for Him 
in the way of Godhead. I intimate nothing as to the cause or the 
manner of His potency among other men. I only insist that, of 
all who ever wore the raiment of humanity, He has cut in human- 
ity the largest likeness of Himself. Of all, He has been fullest of 
that peculiar force which awes and fascinates and holds and thrills 
and transforms others. 

Study Him during His dwelling in the flesh in Judea. Aris- 
tocracy bends at His feet. Lowliness hastens into his presence. 
Culture feels His attraction. Ignorance hears him gladly. Pov- 
erty leaps to follow Him. Wealth runs to meet Him. The 
widest extremes of heart and mind and society are drawn to- 
gether within the circle of His mighty magnetism ; and asceti- 
cism in James, caution in Nicodemus, dash in Peter, devotion in 
John, dulness in Philip, and skepticism in Thomas, all crowd 

99 ' 



around Him, imbibe His spirit, take on His marks, tie themselves 
to His person, and turn to follow Him, without deviation, wher- 
ever He leads the way. 

Study Him in all the following centuries. More than eigh- 
teen hundred years have passed since He went from Olivet to 
Heaven. Multitudes beyond computation have rallied to His 
standard and worn His name. They have come from all the ages, 
lived in all the countries, and spoken all the languages. They 
have been unlike in birth, in circumstance, in education, in em- 
ployment, and in preference. They have, however, become 
assimilated in aspiration and character and pursuit — calling Jesus 
their Lord ; enthroning Him in their hearts, the hope of glory ; 
gathering themselves into companies for the manifestation of His 
praise ; living on promises fragrant with His breath ; and show- 
ing their loyalty by a cheerful sacrifice of all that the world holds 
dearest. 

Study Him today. Go into city or country, into lane or 
street, into near or remote neighborhoods. Go into cottage or 
mansion, into hospital or prison, into shop or store. Go into 
kitchen or parlor, into school or senate. Mingle with high or 
low, with rich or poor, with sick or well. Visit with the happy 
or sad, with the strong or weak, with the young or old. Wher- 
ever you look, you find the marks of Jesus. While differing in 
class and color and condition, they are one in adoration and love 
and service of the Man of Bethlehem. 

Surely, no such virtue has ever gone forth from any other 
man. To behold Him with eye or faith, is to fall in love with 
Hiin. To hear Him, is to follow Him. To know Him, is to be 
His. 

" O, the joy of knowing Jesus ! 

It is shining on my soul : 
I am having His salvation, 
And the power that makas me whole." 

There is an immortal fragrance about His person. The power 
of His presence is not a mere legend or memory or tradition of 
the past. He is the same yesterday, and today, and for ever. 

100 



What He has been He is and will always be. What has come of 
intimacy with Him will always come of intimacy with Him. 
Give Him the chance, and He will attract humanity. Lift Him 
up, and He will draw all men unto Him. Make way for Him, 
and the hardest nature will blossom into some of His sweetness, 
and the ugliest will take on some of His beauty, and the weakest 
will wear some of His strength. 

Association with Jesus Christ leads us into the conviction of 
His Divinity. Discussing the matchless influence of the Son of 
Mary, I have not, so far, discussed the cause or the manner of 
His influence. I have considered Him merely as I might have 
considered any human being of notable power among his fellow- 
beings — merely as I have studied Bonaparte, and Gonsalvo, and 
Howard, and Sheridan, and Clay, and as I might have studied 
hundreds of others. 

It is not an exhaustive and satisfying study. It is not con- 
ceivable that such marvellous and peculiar force as has come from 
contact with Him, during and since His dwelling incarnate in 
Judea, is merely human. 

I have conceded and maintain the capacity of man to affect 
and impress man. History teems with the testimony. Humanity 
can enduringly and mightily move humanity. The influence of 
the influential goes beyond his personal presence, and outlasts his 
stay on earth. Being dead, he still speaketh — speaketh in the 
books he has bequeathed, in the feelings he has inspired, in the 
thoughts he has kindled, in the words he has left ringing in the 
ears of his generation, and in the works which still tell of his 
genius and industry. Abel is still speaking in his faith, and 
David in his songs, and Paul in his writings. Shufu is still 
speaking in the Egyptian pyramids, and Michael Angelo in the 
temple of St. Peter, and Guttenberg in the printing-press, and 
Washington in the construction and Lincoln in the reconstruc- 
tion of American nationality. 

Insisting, however, on man's might with man, and insisting 
on the possibility of that might holding sway through crowding 

101 



centuries, and through lands he never saw, have we adequately 
apprehended and measured the influence of Jesus Christ ? 

Let human influence extend and perpetuate itself as it may, 
it is ever less operative and perceptible as time hastens on its 
course. That of Jesus Christ encounters neither blight nor dim- 
inution. Ages can not dim it. Familiarity can not impair it. 
Novelty can not supplant it. Its kingdom is an everlasting 
kingdom. 

Let human influence extend and perpetuate itself as it may, 
it flows along narrow channels. Heroism only acts on heroes. 
Love only moves lovers. Scholarship only stirs scholars. That 
of Jesus Christ has freedom of no one course. It has hold not 
merely on the active or the contemplative, or on the cultured or 
the ignorant, or on the rich or the poor ; but its streams the whole 
creation reach. 

Let human influence extend and perpetuate itself as it may, 
it is of limited efficiency within the sphere of the heart. It can 
fashion habits, or mould manners, or start styles ; but how little 
it can do with the soul. That of Jesus Christ has here its pecu- 
liar place and potency. It can quicken dead souls. It can trans- 
form the earthlj' into the heavenly. It can turn the old man into 
the new man. Medea is fabled to have brought ^son back out 
of the decrepitude of age into the puissance of youth, by drawing 
the blood from his veins and pouring in the juices of invigorating 
herbs. But it is no fable that Jesus Christ is able to save to the 
uttermost all that come by Him to God. It is no fable that, if 
any man be in Christ Jesus, he is a new creature, old things hav- 
ing passed away, and all things having become new. It is no 
fable, it is a necessary conclusion, that such a man as Jesus Christ 
must be more than man ; and that, being more than man, He 
must be all He claims, God over all, blessed for ever more. 

Association with Jesus Christ accomplishes not only an in- 
ward experience, but also an outward expression. It can be 
observed by others, as well as realized by ourselves. 

A bliss the world knows nothing of is theirs who have come 

102 



into intimacy with the Son of God. It is a fact beyond doubt. 
It is a joy, better than gold, brighter than rubies, sweeter than 
honey or the honey-coinb. It is Heaven begun below — crowding 
and pervading and thrilling the soul, until the soul can ask no 
greater good, but Heaven. 

" O that I now the rest might know, 
Believe, and enter in : 
Now, Saviour, now the power bestow, 
And let me cease from sin." 

But there is also an external disclosure of the brothers and 
sisters of Immanuel — a revelation to the children of the world of 
the children of God. Their conversation is in Heaven. They 
have the mind of Christ. They walk even as He walked. 

Discovering, in their carriage and fortune, that they are dis- 
ciples of Christ, they also show their discipleship in the contempt 
or indifference or opposition which they provoke from the enemies 
of Christ. This contempt or indifference or opposition is a mark 
of their discipleship. 

Some have borne His marks in the endurance of chain and 
fire and sword, because of their confession and service of their 
crucified Master and Redeemer. Some have borne His marks in 
the loss of business and home and societ3 r , because of their love 
and worship of their Saviour and Sovereign. Giovanni Berso is a 
young Italian. He accepts the Gospel, and, shortly afterward, 
visits his dying mother, who has learned of his renunciation of 
Romanism. Taking his hand, she says, " You love your mother, 
do you not?" He replies, "More than lean express." She 
says, " I am dyiag. Promise me that you will do what I ask ; 
and before you answer me, think of it as the last request of your 
dying mother." He replies, " What is it? I will do all that it 
is in my power to do for you." She says, " No ! I do not want 
a' conditional promise. Assure me that you will do what I ask." 
He replies, " I can only repeat that I will do all in my. power." 
She says, " Very well. Tomorrow morning I will tell you what 
I expect." The next morning she says, "The priest is coming 

103 



in an hour, to give me the communion. I ask, as my last request, 
that you will recite the prayers with me. " He is cut to the heart, 
and replies, "O mother, you know I can not do that." She 
says, " Then go away, and do not appear here again," and turns 
her face to the wall. He replies, " O my mother, ask for all I 
have : ask for my blood, and you shall have it ; but do not ask 
me to deny my Saviour in offering to creatures the worship which 
belongs only to Him." She says, " Go ; you are no longer my 
son." He wanders about all day, and returns at evening, enter- 
ing his mother's room with great grief. She holds out her hand, 
and says, " Be my son : I will respect your convictions, and you 
will respect mine. Stay with me, and close my eyes." 

In our land and time, we may not be called upon to demon- 
strate our discipleship by the endurance of such denial and pain 
as have befallen the saints of other lands and times. We may not 
be called upon to prove our loyalty to the Lord by marks of suf- 
fering in our body or in our condition. We will, however, carry 
such marks of our high and holy and honorable relation as can be 
known by all men. We will wear the Name which is above every 
name where it can be seen by all who see us. 

Association with Jesus Christ works resemblance among all 
who are His associates. All who are His bearing His impression, 
all must bear the same impression. Looking like Him, they 
must look like each other. As far as we have knowledge of them, 
there could not be greater difference between two men than there 
is between John and Peter. But, as they appear before the San- 
hedrim, its members discern in them one spirit, and discern in 
that spirit the spirit of the Lord Jesus Christ. Indeed, there are 
marked differences in the entire company of disciples ; but still you 
can not help observing their likeness to Jesus Christ, and their 
moral likeness to each other. 

Look at the Christian Church in all ages and countries and 
denominations, made up of converts of all classes and conditions 
and opportunities ; and how manifest it is that its members are 
members one of another, and all members of the body of Jesus 

104 



Christ. Bishop Hamline is presiding at a session of the Ohio 
Conference, and is present at its Sabbath morning Love-feast. 
Gladness feasts all souls. A little colored boy rises to speak. 
Down go all heads at his presumption in occupying the floor when 
so many eminent saints are waiting for opportunity. To make 
matters worse, he becomes confused, and can only shout, " Sugar, 
sugar, sugar," until he is sung to his seat. It looks as if he has 
killed a good meeting. But Bishop Hamline says, " I am think- 
ing of the uniformity there is among the people of God in their 
experience of Divine grace, and in their relation of their experi- 
ence. David is a gifted man. He has had the best education of 
his times ; has the endowment of poetry ; and has the inspiration 
of the Divine Spirit ; but when he endeavors to tell the riches of 
religion, he can only say, "It is sweeter than honey, or the 
honey-comb." Here is a little colored boy, who was born a 
slave. He has neither education, nor gift, nor poetry ; but he 
has the religion that David had, and he tells his experience in 
about David's style." 

There is diversity; but it is the diversity which is in unity. 
There is one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of 
all, Who is above all, and through all, and in all. The glory 
which the Father has given the Son, the Son has given His fol- 
lowers, and they are one, even as the Father and the Son are one : 
and thus of Him the whole family in Heaven and in earth is 
named. 

Claiming that we belong to the Lord Jesus Christ, let us be 
sure that we have His marks within : for, if any man have not the 
Spirit of Christ, he is none of His. 

Claiming that we belong to the Lord Jesus Christ, let us have 
His marks without : for, if we walk in the light, as He is in the 
light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus 
Christ His Son cleanseth us from all sin. 

Claiming that we belong to the Lord Jesus Christ, let us not 
think it strange that we have His marks which come through the 
enmity of the world : for we have His word, " Because ye are not 

105 



of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore 
the world hateth you." 

Claiming that we belong to the Lord Jesus Christ, let His 
marks be visible. Let all we meet, whether they approve us or 
condemn us, take knowledge of us that we have been with Him 
and learned of Him. 

Claiming that we belong to the Lord Jesus Christ, let us 
glory in His marks, no matter with what pains they have been 
w T on. The graduate exultingly hangs up his diploma for inspec- 
tion. The mason gladly parades his regalia. The soldier proudly 
shows his scars. Lafayette, struck with a ball at Germantown, 
exclaims, " I prize this wound as the most valuable honor." So 
Paul uncovers the scourges he has received in the sendee of the 
Captain of his salvation as badges of his devotion and service, 
and as heralds of his crown of righteousness. Would that we all 
were more covetous of the marks of the Lord Jesus, and had 
more of them to show ! They bestow a better diploma than any 
college. They give a brighter regalia than any lodge. They tell 
of a grander triumph than any won in any worldly warfare. They 
proclaim us now princes among the sons of men ; and, walking 
worthy of the vocation wherewith we are called, they uplift us, 
beyond the flash of ducal coronet, and beyond the gleam of royal 
diamond, into the company of nobles who, through tribulation, 
have gone up to be without fault before the throne of God. 



106 



XI, 

" And she said unto him, Give me a blessing : for thou hast given me a 
south land ; give me also springs of water. And Caleb gave her the upper 
springs and the nether springs." — Judges, 1:15. 

About seven miles south of Hebron, in among the mountains, 
is Debir, a royal city of the Canaanites, which was captured by 
Joshua in his first campaign for the subjugation of the land prom- 
ised to Israel. Before this capture, and by the Canaanites, it was 
called Kirjath-sepher, meaning "Book-town;" and from this 
fact some authorities have inferred the existence of letters and 
manuscripts in that region prior to the Israelitish conquest. As 
is well known, the Phoenicians are credited with the formation 
and use, at a very early period, of those alphabetical characters 
which have inspired and shaped the written language of all other 
peoples. By no means is it improbable that these Phoenicians, 
who were largely itinerant merchants, had brought some of their 
literature into this region, and left a library of palm-leaves or 
skins in this town, thus giving it the name of " Book-town." 

By some it has been assumed that the Israelites had no writ 
ten language until long after the Exodus ; and that therefore 
Moses could not have inscribed the Law on tables of stone, as is 
claimed in the Pentateuch. But it is known that the Phoenicians 
had their trading stations close to Goshen, the settlement of the 
Israelites, at least as early as that settlement ; and, says Watson, 
in his "Exposition of Judges," " What is more likely than that 
the Hebrews, who spoke a language akin to the Phoenicians, 
should have shared the discovery of letters almost from the first, 
and practiced the art of writing in the days of their favor with 
the monarchs of the Nile Valley?" 

Conceding that, during the dark, hard, long night of their 
servitude, the Israelites could have no heart or time for the culti- 
vation of literature, Moses, full of his Divine mission, would 
continue its study and recognize its worth in prosecution ; and, 
even if he did not, God was all the while preparing him for the 

107 



mighty work to which he was ordained. For God works all 
things into His sovereign plans, employing both sacred and secu- 
lar agencies in the accomplishment of His purposes, and making 
both the friendship and the wrath of man to praise Him. 
Quoting Watson again, "Egyptians and Phoenicians have their 
share in originating that culture which mingles its stream with 
sacred revelation and religion. As, long afterwards, there came 
the printing-press, a product of human skill and science, filling 
Europe with the doctrine and spirit of the Reformation, so human 
genius and invention are levied on for the publication of the Law 
given through Moses. ' ' 

God is God over all. His providence includes and uses all hu- 
man actions and gifts ; and they are no friends of God who denounce 
or discard any thing which can be subservient to the advancement 
of His kingdom and the glorification of His name in the world. 
The devil has no rights which God is bound to respect ; and it is 
our duty, as coworkers together with God, to lay hold of every 
art and science and treasure which is accessible, and make it give 
Him tribute. ' ' The earth is the Lord's, and the fulness thereof ;" 
and differences between genuine Christianity and genuine Science 
are never real and vital — they are only misconstructions of both 
by those who do not know enough of either to discuss them. 
What God hath joined together let not ignorance put assunder ; 
and He enjoins both culture and grace, and requires of each that 
it sanctify the Lord God in its heart, and give its answer to every 
question of its claim with meekness and fear. 

Addressing ourselves again to the immediate history, we are 
in the midst of the sights and the sounds of war. Apparently, 
Debir, or Kirjath-sepher, is once more in the possession of the 
Canaanites, its former possessors ; and its capture is not only a 
discredit, but also a constant and serious menace to Israel. For 
the honor and safety of Israel, it must be reconquered. 

Caleb is in command of the proposed campaign ; aud, to 
arouse the young men of the nation to action and courage, he 
offers his daughter Achsah as a prize to whoever will take the 

108 



stronghold. It certainly seems to us a strange bounty with which 
to invite enlistment and enterprise ; but the maiden is not reported 
to have put in any demurrer. By the custom of the times, a hus- 
band was a matter of necessity — a woman without one being not 
only in a kind of disgrace, but also faring particularly hard, when 
the lot of all women was much harder than it is since the Gospel 
has worked its wonderful social revolution. A husband was also 
a matter of patriotism — women as well as men exulting in the 
covenant which guaranteed to the seed of Abraham so splendid a 
future, and longing to lend a hand to the promised triumph when 
Canaan should sit as queen among all the peoples of the world. 
And a husband was a matter of religion — the women being all 
anxious to be the mother of the Messiah Who, according to their 
hopes, might be born an} T day, of any daughter of the sacred com- 
monwealth. 

Excuse, however, or palliate, as we may, it seems to us a great 
humiliation and wrong for a maiden to be offered for marriage in 
the market, or to wait until some man, who might be brave enough 
and yet lack every element of a good husband, should win her 
hand by some lucky stroke. Nevertheless, many a Jewish maiden 
drew a first-class prize in the matrimonial lottery, made a noble 
mother, and even won renown in public places. We must not for- 
get, however, that no true woman can justify herself for the 
neglect of those duties which, in the domestic economy, are 
peculiarly hers, by any renown she may gain in other scenes or 
works of life. No law should be in the way of her being or do- 
ing all which it is in her to be and do ; but no law can warrant 
her in ceasing to be a woman or to do a woman's work. She may 
be all she can ; but she must, with all she may be, be what she 
must. " We," says Watson again, "perhaps are in sight of an 
age when the injustice done to women may be replaced by an in- 
justice they do to themselves. Liberty is their right, but the old 
duties remain as great as ever. Without a very keen sense ot 
Christian honor and obligation among women, their enfranchise- 
ment will be the loss of what has held society together, and made 

109 



Women who are trying to not be women, are 
the worst foes women have to encounter on their way to the recog- 
nition they ought to have. A man has no right to liberty who 
will not be a man ; and a woman has no right to liberty who is un- 
willing to be a woman. 

Once more : with all our deprecation of Achsah's fortune in 
being auctioneered to the highest bidder, was it any more degrad- 
ing than the marriages which women make for themselves who 
choose gold rather than goodness, and sell out for jewels rather 
than for worth ? Is it not every way better and holier to wait un- 
married until called home to the bridal of the skies, than to cast 
herself at the head of every passing dunce or lout or rascal, and 
be known as the wife of a creature who is only a man in form ? 
O, it is better and holier every way than to be of those told of by 
the poet who, 

" Furbelowed and flounced around. 
With feet too delicate to touch the ground, 
Stretch the neck, and roll the eager eye, 
And sigh for every fool that flutters by." 

Caleb's daughter, Achsah, is won by a young man named 
Othniel. By what particular exploit he distinguished himself, we 
are not informed ; but he so carried himself as to be adjudged the 
prize, and Achsah becomes his wife. Evidently she has had 
previous acquaintance with him, for he is her cousin ; and it may 
be that she hoped for just such an outcome, by giving him her 
blessing as he went forth on the march, and all the w T hile praying 
for his safety and victory. It is manifest, at all events; that she 
fully accepted the outcome, and gave herself diligently to meet all 
its responsibilities. Caleb, her father, seems to have given her a 
farm as a marriage portion. No doubt it is in many respects de- 
sirable ; but it is not well watered ; and she asks him to amend 
this defect by adding a field with suitable springs of water : thus 
showing her good judgment in farms, and her wish to be a good 
helpmeet to her husband. 

Every good wife desires to be a good helpmeet to her hus- 
band. Achsah, becoming the wife of Othniel, does not begin 

110 



married life by assuming the air and dress and style of a million- 
aire ; or by demanding a fine house ; or by looking for servants ; 
or by prattling about society ; or by setting up for a doll, or gad- 
der, or lounger : but she goes to work to help her husband to 
make a home and a living. Born well, and raised well, she has 
not been reared in ignorance and idleness ; and she has evidently 
improved her opportunities, and is ready to advise Othniel at the 
outset, and willing to carry her share of all necessary burdens. 
Being Caleb's daughter, I have no doubt that she has had all the 
advantages of her father's means and standing, and has all the 
accomplishments of the most fortunate young women of the land. 
But she has also been trained to work — and not only to work, but 
to work wisely. Where the husband is all that he should be, and 
the wife is all that she should be, before either has any right to 
get married, and both lay themselves out to do their utmost, mar- 
riage is never a failure. But, that a wife may be indeed a help- 
meet to her husband, she must as a maiden have due instruction 
and preparation by her parents ; and, as a wife, she must have 
due deference and encouragement from her husband. Only by 
due acquaintance with his business can she have due interest in it; 
and only by due interest in it can she have due part in its success 
either by economy, or by plan, or by toil. 

Happy home, where husband and wife begin its establishment 
on the same mental and moral plane, and grow on together with 
equal pace, as the years go by— neither lagging behind the other ! 

Hapless home, where one gains, and the other loses ; where 
one has different interests and tastes from the other ; and where 
one has any secrets from the other ! 

Home is meant to be the best place on earth. It is meant to 
be the type of the heavenly home. And husband and wife must 
both work together to make home what it is meant to be, neither 
disparaging nor ignoring the other. 

Home ! Let it have the upper room in the care and love and 
toil of its every member. Let each make it so full of brightness 
and sweetness that none will get away from within its magic ring; 

111 



for, if any one does not like to stay at home, it is generally be- 
cause it is not much of a home for which to stay. 

Home ! Soon enough there will be empty seats at its fire- 
side and table. Soon enough its best and dearest will have been 
carried out of its doors, never to enter them again. Therefore, 
while we are still together, let us each so carry ourself to the 
others that, when any are gone, we who are left may have no 
regrets for any lack or unkindness we have done them. And 
when at last the old home is entirely dismantled on earth, may it 
be re-established in Heaven — not one absent from its immortal 
blessedness. 

" Good-night, good-night, to every one : 
Be each heart freed from care : 
May every one now seek his home, 
And find contentment there." 



112 



XII. 



"And it came to pass, as the angels were gone away from them into 
Heaven, the shepherds said one to another, Let us now go even unto Beth- 
lehem, and see this thing which is come to pass, which the Lord hath made 
known unto us." — Luke, 2:15. 

A perusal of the Sacred Volume calls our attention to two 
places within the boundaries of the " Holy Land " bearing the 
name of Bethlehem — one belonging to the tribe of Judah, and the 
other belonging to the tribe of Zebulun. About the former 
gathers the interest of the Christian world. It is the Bethlehem 
which sits in the highest seat of the affections and thoughts of 
the men and women who delight in bowing at the name of Jesus. 
A competent authority says " It is five miles south of Jerusalem, 
and a little to the right of the road to Hebron : and occupies part 
of the sides and summit of a narrow ridge, shooting out eastward 
from the central chain of Judean mountains, and breaking down 
into deep valleys on the east, north and south. Beneath the vil- 
lage, the steep slopes are carefully terraced, and these terraces 
sweep in graceful curves around the ridge from top to bottom. 
In the valleys below, and on a little plain to the eastward, are 
some cornfields, whose fertility, doubtless, gave the place its 
name, Beth-UhetnJ house of bread ;' while the dense foliage of the 
olives and fig-trees ranged in stately rows along the hill sides, and 
the glistening leaves of the vines that hang in festoons over the 
terrace banks, serve to remind us, amid the desolations of the 
whole land, and especially in contrast with the painful barrenness 
of the neighboring desert, that this little district is still Ephrath, 
4 the fruitful.' Immediately beyond these fields and terraced 
gardens is ' the wilderness of Judea. ' It is in full view from the 
heights of Bethlehem. White limestone hills thrown confusedly 
together, with deep ravines winding in and out among them, con- 
stitute its chief features. Not a solitary tree, or shrub, or tuft of 
green grass, is anywhere to be seen. The village contains about 

113 



five hundred houses. The streets are narrow and crooked ; but , 
being here and there arched over, and having the rude balconies 
of the quaint houses projecting irregularly along their sides, they 
have a picturesque mediaeval look about them." 

About foretelling the moral pre-eminence of Bethlehem 
among the villages of earth, and His coming, Whose birth is to 
make it illustrious in all eternity as well as all time, Micah de- 
scribes it as insignificant and unimportant among the thousands 
of Judah. And it was not particularly noteworthy among the 
towns of that country for character or occurrences or scenery. 
And now, following the authority alread}^ cited, "there is nothing 
in the village itself, or the surrounding scenery, to attract at- 
tention, if we except the shrines which superstition has erected 
over the sites of apocryphal holy places. ' ' 

But a careful examination of the chronicles of the village 
discloses, around and within its precincts, the existence of some 
interesting features, and the occurrence of some memorable events. 

A mile to the north, on the direct road from Jerusalem to 
Bethel, is a little building which to this day indicates the burial 
place of Rachel, the beloved wife of Jacob, and the prospect of 
whose obtainment made fourteen years of servitude seem onty a 
few days. 

In one of those cornfields below the village, Ruth, whose 
generous devotion to her mother-in-law has made her name a 
synonym of obedience and virtue, gleaned for herself and the 
stricken Naomi. It may have been on one of those threshing- 
floors which are still visible that she spent that night at the feet of 
Boaz. And it is certain that in this locality occurred the train of 
circumstances which eventuated in her marriage to Boaz — the 
marriage which blended Gentile and Jew into one blood, and gave 
to humanity the God-man, Jesus of Bethlehem, in whose honor 
and memory we keep our Christmas. 

In this neighborhood, too, David was born, and kept his 
father's sheep, and slew bear and lion in their defense. Amid the 
wild mountaineers of this region he was trained to handle the sling 

m 



so effectively; and in the awfuluess and grandeur of these gorges 
breaking toward the Dead Sea, and in the loneliness of yon desert, 
he gathered materials for those lyrics with which he has enriched 
the world — going forth under the Divine direction, from these 
humble and solitary scenes, to reach that sublime summit in the 
annals of earth " where shine the few immortal names which are 
not born to die." 

In the light, however, of the history we are now considering, 
all the occurrences and places just mentioned pale into insignifi- 
cance. Beyond them the stream of Time has steadily passed ; and 
long sweeps of years have rolled by since the burial of Rachel, and 
the marriage of Ruth, and the marvels of David. 

In the valley adjoining the town on the northeast — the valley 
where babbled the brook for whose refreshing waters David longed 
so earnestly when ' ' in the holds of Adullam, ' ' and for which 
three of his mighty men hazarded their lives — some shepherds 
are watching their flocks by night, when suddenly strange sounds 
startle their ears. Looking upward, they see strange sights : 
11 And, lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory 
of the Lord shone round about them : and they were sore afraid. 
And the angel said unto them, Fear not : for, behold, I bring you 
good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. For unto 
you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is 
Christ the Lord. And this shall be a sign unto you ; Ye shall 
find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger. 
And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly 
host praising God, and saying, Glory to God in the highest, and 
on earth peace, good will toward men. And it came to pass, as 
the angels were gone away from them into Heaven, the shepherds 
said one to another, Let us now go even unto Bethlehem, and see 
this thing which is come to pass, which the Lord hath made 
known unto us. ' ' 

And what strange thing has come to pass ? What has 
occurred, so momentous as to call for the birth of an additional 
star in the expanse above, and for the crowding of the galleries of 

115 



the atmosphere with bands of angels, and for the delegation of 
celestial messengers to carry the tidings ? 

What has occurred ? Jesus is born into the human family. 
The Seed of woman, Who is to bruise the serpent's head, is come. 
The Seed of Abraham, in Whom all are to be blessed, is come. 
The Shiloh, unto Whom the gathering of the people is to be, is 
come. The long hoped-for Child, the long promised Son, Whose 
Name is to be Wonderful, Counsellor, The Mighty God, The 
Everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace, on Whose shoulders is 
to rest the government of the universe, and of Whose kingdom 
there is to be no end, is come — the Desire of all nations, the 
Redeemer of His people from their sins. 

Who disputes the wonder fulness of the occurrence, or doubts 
that it was worthy of the journey and search of those shepherds 
on that morning of immortal memory ? It is worthy of perpetual 
quest and study. It is not our fortune to be of those shepherds, 
wending their way from the sheep-cote to the manger. It is not 
possible, during this service, for us to make a bodily pilgrimage 
to the spot whither they turned their adoring steps. Centuries 
are between them and us. Hundreds of leagues part us from the 
sacred spot. Nevertheless, we can all go in mind. In the vehi- 
cle of thought we can make the pilgrimage while we tarry here a 
little longer. There is a sense in which even now we can say to 
each other, in all seriousness, ' ' Let us now go even unto Beth- 
lehem, and see this thing which is come to pass, which the Lord 
hath made known unto us. ' ' 

Thus attempting the excursion, and reaching its terminus, 
we see a wonderful Person. A babe — a Divine babe — is lying in 
that manger. In Him dwells all the fulness of the Godhead 
bodily. He is the everlasting Jehovah, the Authur of all created 
being, the Conservator of all existence, the Governor of all worlds. 
He is the King of kings and Lord of lords : God over all , blessed 
for ever more. Iualienably attaching to Him are all Divine 
attributes ; and belonging to Him are all Divine designations ; 
and owning His summons are all Divine prerogatives. 

116 



But He is a veritable babe. That little one is a veritable 
human being in infancy. He has a human body. He has a 
human soul. He has human possibilities of enjoyment and suf- 
fering. He eats, drinks, grows. He is very man. He is one 
like unto us. He is our kinsman. 

Divine and human nature are mysteriously, but really, united 
in that infant of a day. Godhead and manhood are both to- 
gether in that organism. I can not explain the manner of their 
junction, any more than I can explain that of my own body and 
soul ; but in some manner God and man enter into the makeup of 
that single personality — the Creator, and the creature : the Sov- 
ereign, and the subject : the Eternal, and the temporal : the 
Infinite, and the finite : the Impassible, and the suffering. Verily, 
great is the mystery of Godliness ! 

We see a wonderful exhibition of benignity. Men are not 
likely to carry themselves kindly beneath a burden of unprovoked 
injury and insult ; and, especially, to endure without resentment 
long, successive years of provocation ; and, more especially, to 
rush in on an offender, in the midst of his onsets, with offers of 
forgiveness and friendship — with overtures of reconciliation. 

Neither has God heretofore in His administration, so far as 
we have access to its records, appeared to have much toleration for 
offenders against His Government. The disloyal angels were 
ejected from the skies. The disobedient progenitors of the human 
race were excluded from Edenic bliss. The evil-minded mockers 
of the antediluvian age were hurled from the chances of probation 
by the deluge which they had mocked. The Egyptian oppressors 
of Israel were engulfed in the depths of the Red Sea. And the 
murmuring descendants of Abraham were entombed in the fast- 
nesses of the wilderness. Thus History, whatever may have 
been the forecasts of Prophecy, kindled no expectations that He, — 
the Lord of all, — so holy in all His ways, and so righteous in all 
His works, would mercifully interpose in behalf of disloyal man- 
kind. 

Nevertheless, His thoughts are not as our thoughts, nor His 

117 



ways as our ways. For centuries He has been arranging for 
human redemption ; and His preparations are now complete. The 
due time has come ; and Bethlehem is all astir, because " God hath 
sent forth His Son, made of a woman, made under the law, to re- 
deem them that were under the law, that we might receive the 
adoption of sons. . . .We see Jesus made a little lower than the 
angels, for the suffering of death, that He, by the grace of God, 
should taste death for every man." 

And we see a wonderful fulfilment of Prophecy. It has been 
foretold that "the Seed of woman shall bruise the serpent's 
head ; ' ' and here He lies in His manger. It has been foretold 
that in Abraham shall ' ' all the families of the earth be blessed ; ' ' 
and here is his long-hoped for Son, Whose day the patriarch saw 
afar off. It has been foretold that ' ' the sceptre shall not depart 
from Judah, nor the lawgiver from between his feet, until the 
Shiloh shall come;" and here, just before the overthrow of 
Judah's supremac}^, is the Shiloh unto Whom " the gathering of 
the people " is to be. It has been foretold that the Messiah shall 
issue from the loins of David ; and, though the crown has long 
since fallen from his brow, and the insignia of royalty have long 
since passed from his family, pointing to this babe, from between 
the parted skies, cherubic voices are chanting, ' ' Unto you is born 
this day, in the city of David, a Saviour, which is Christ the 
Lord." It has been foretold that a virgin shall be His mother ; 
and, informed of her Divinely-assigned office, the chosen Mary 
sings, " My soul doth magnify the Lord, and my spirit hath re- 
joiced in God, my Saviour." It has been foretold that Bethlehem 
shall be the scene of the matchless birth ; and, while different 
places vie with each other for the honor of the nativity of different 
human celebrities, this little town is renowned through earth and 
Heaven as the birthplace of Him Who ' ' is the propitiation 
for our sins, and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the 
whole world." Verily, "the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of 
Prophecy. ' ' 

We see a beginning of a wonderful outcome. Although the 

118 



birth of a babe is a common, and to many an insignificant, occur- 
rence, momentous concomitants and consequences connect them- 
selves with the advent of this child into the human family. 
Because of His coming, the outraged authority of the Supreme 
Being is acknowledged and adored and declared, His government 
is honored, and His law is satisfied. Amnesty is extended to our 
fallen and offending race ; forgiveness and restoration are possible 
to every individual sinner ; and salvation and all its benedictions 
are within easy reach of all the wretched children of want. Ap- 
propriating this salvation, the disobedient are forgiven ; and the 
forgiven are created into newness of life ; and the newborn are 
given sonship to God. Given sonship to God, they are assured 
direction in perplexity, and help in impotence, and peace in tribu- 
lation, and support in the swellings of the river of death, and 
resurrection to " glory and honor and immortality." 

Bring forth the royal diadem, and crown this Babe of Bethle- 
hem the Lord of all. " Behold, what manner of love the Father 
hath bestowed upon us," that, by the oblation of His only- 
begotten Son, we, too, are come to be " the sons of God ;" and 
wonder not that the record of the amazing bestowment should be 
called "the glorious Gospel of the blessed God:" for, if its 
announcements are not "glad tidings, " no ear has ever greeted 
glad tidings ; and if its news are not " good news," no messenger 
has ever told good news. 

As soon as the shepherds, in whose company we have been 
making this hour's journey to the city of David, heard that Jesus 
was born in Bethlehem, they went in search of Him — making 
business and convenience and pleasure all subservient to the great 
pursuit. And so should all the children of men, because it was 
for all the children of men that " the Word was made flesh." 
First informed of His advent, first told of 4 ' the I^amb of God 
which taketh away the sin of the world, " we ought to hasten into 
His presence. We ought to proffer Him our heart's richest adora- 
tion. We ought to render Him our life's uttermost devotion, 
We ought to forsake all else and follow Him. 

119 



But it is not needful that we should go in the body to Bethle- 
hem. It is no easier now to find Him there than elsewhere. It 
is now Bethlehem the world over. From every place of human 
life we now have access to the Lord's Anointed. Whenever and 
wherever we cease from evil, and do good, and lay ourselves on 
His altar, and make mention of His righteousness, and show forth 
His praise, then and there we find Him ; and then and there He 
manifests Himself unto us as He does not unto the world ; and 
then and there we know " the joy of knowing Jesus." 

Even by us, far away from the scene of its occurrence, His 
birthday is worthy of grateful commemoration ; for to us has the 
word of His salvation come. Gratefully let us celebrate it every 
time it recurs. Let us celebrate it as long as we live, hallowing 
it with gifts — with gifts to our friends, with gifts to the poor, and 
especially with gifts of ourselves to Him who gave Himself to us. 

From our childhood we have all heard of the "yule-log." 
It was a large block of wood, brought into the house with great 
ceremony on Christmas Eve, laid in the fire-place, and lighted 
with a brand of the last Christmas Eve's log which, at the close 
of the festivities, had been carefully put away : the ceremony 
being meant to indicate that the Christmas fire never burns out. 
Often as the day comes and passes, let us not dismiss with its 
passage the actions and sentiments which it developes ; but each 
Christmas let us cultivate feelings and thoughts which we shall 
cherish and show through all intervening days, and employ them 
as kindling for the flames of charity and gratitude when the next 
hallowed anniversary shall arrive, and so make our Christmas 
last all the year. And when at last it comes to us no more amid 
mortal scenes, may we have gone to keep it in the home of the 
glorified, where, with all with whom we have kept it here, 

" At the name of Jesus bowing, 

Falling prostrate at His feet, 
King of kings, in Heaven, we'll crown Him, 

When our journey is complete." 



120 



XIII. 



" Then took he Him up in his arms."— Luke, 2 : 28. 

"And, behold, there was a man in Jerusalem, [when Jesus 
was born,] whose name was Simeon ; and the same man was just 
and devout, waiting for the consolation of Israel : and the Holy- 
Ghost was upon him. And it was revealed unto him by the Holy- 
Ghost, that he should not see death, before he had seen the Lord's 
Christ." As, according to his habit, he was one day worshipping 
in the Temple, Jesus, being about six weeks old, was brought in 
by His parents, that He might be duly set apart as the ford's. 
Simeon took the Babe in his arms, thus declaring his gladness at 
the coming of Him Who was to save His people from their sins, 
and also hailing the little Child to all the privileges of the Church. 
The carriage of this venerable saint toward this Babe of few daj^s 
and humble parentage is not without important suggestions to us. 

Attendance upon the House of God is an obligation which 
can not be innocently or safely forgotten. Calling us to presence 
at its altars, its Divine Builder declares, "I will glorify the 
House of My glory — I will distinguish it with a signal distinction . ' ' 
Encouraging us to the employment of all its ordinances, He 
declares, ' ' In all places where I record My Name, I will come 
unto thee, and bless thee — I will bless thee, meeting Me in My 
House, no matter how common its appointments, nor how humble 
its attendants, nor how plain its services." Furnishing us an 
example, while incarnate among men, He failed not in going to 
synagogue and Temple as He had opportunity : though He had 
no need to do so for His own edification, and though synagogue 
and Temple were in the charge of unworthy priests. 

Inspired to represent the Divine mind to the early Christians, 
Paul admonishes them, both in practice and in precept, not to for- 
sake the assembling of themselves together. And the same 
admonition applies to us, though dangers should alarm, or fatigue 
should plead for our absence, or visitors should tax our time. 

121 



None is so aged, or so learned, or so spiritually minded, as to be 
exempt from the obligation ; for Simeon was advanced in life, and 
devout, and the Holy Ghost was upon him. The Divine counsel 
decreed the appearance of Jesus in the Temple on that particular 
occasion ; and had Simeon been absent, no matter with what 
justification, he would have missed that particular sight of the 
Consolation of Israel for which he had so long been waiting. The 
grace which you need for comfort or deliverance or preparation in 
some nearing emergency, may be ordained for communication at 
the very service from which you absent yourself. ' ' How amiable 
are Thy tabernacles, O Lord of hosts. Blessed are they that 
dwell in Thy house : they will be still praising Thee ' ' — they will 
always be seeing new beauties, and singing new songs of thanks- 
giving. 

Children, even from their infancy, ought to be carried to the 
House of God, that they may become accustomed to attendance 
there ; that they may be ready for even the first spiritual impres- 
sions and leadings which it may please the Lord to pour upon 
their hearts ; and that the parents may not be hindered in their 
own growth in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and 
Saviour Jesus Christ. 

Children, while infants, ought to be baptized. They are thus 
commended to the favor and keeping of the God of all grace. 
They are thus devoted to the service and use of Him in Whose 
hands their breath is, and Whose are all their ways. And they 
thus, as their reason dawns, recognize that they belong to God, 
through the covenant of their parents ; and their parents recognize 
their obligations to inform them of the covenant made in their be- 
half, and to train them — not merely to teach them, but to train 
them, into the fulfilment of all the obligations of that covenant. 

Children, while young, ought to be brought into the Church. 
Age has no rightful monopoly of membership in the Church of 
Christ. The promise is to the children as well as to their parents. 
And I believe that if the Church and the parents would do their 
part, gathering the children into the fold of the Great Shepherd, 

122 



and giving them proper cultivation, the average of Church char- 
acter would in a generation be highly advanced, and the millen- 
nium hurried up hundreds or thousands of years. And I farther 
believe that the millennium will come, not by angling in spots for 
a few old sinners once a year, but by capturing the children for 
Christ as soon as they are born, and holding them for Christ so 
steadily and tightly that they shall fear the Lord from the begin- 
ning, and never know a subsequent hour in which they are away 
from their Lord and Lover. 

Being grafted into Christ — being cut out of a fallen nature 
and inserted in Christ, as a shoot is cut out of one tree and in- 
serted in another, is becoming a Christian ; for, " if any man be 
in Christ Jesus, he is a new creature." A certain season is better 
than other seasons for grafting a scion into a foreign stock. It 
may, with great labor and pains, be done at other seasons ; but, 
outside of the proper season it will ordinarily be a failure. In the 
right season, it will, in the majority of instances, be a success. 
Childhood is pre-eminently the season for fixing humanity in 
Christ ; for it has pre-eminently that capacity and readiness of 
clinging to another which, touched by the Holy Spirit, is faith in 
Christ. 

Helping childhood into Christ, be as careful and watchful in 
holding it there, until it is fully incorporated into Him, as the 
Tree of Life, as you are that the little shoot which you graft from 
a poor stock into a rich stock shall take in the sap and taste and 
vigor of the richer stock ; and as surely shall childhood maintain 
its relation to Christ, and ripen and sweeten into immortal fruit- 
age. If the Church would do the best possible for itself, it would 
gather in the little children, and keep them, and train them, no 
matter at what cost or pains. Nurtured in the Church from in- 
fancy, they are worth more to it than those who in maturer years 
take their first lessons in Church doctrines and manners, and turn 
into the first paths of Church experience and life. 

Coming into the Church, children ought to have cordial and 
helpful welcome. Alas, and shame, that they do not always have 

123 



such a welcome ! It is far from always that they are taken up 
into the arms of their seniors. Frequently they are discouraged 
from entrance, and are exhorted to tarry without until they are 
older and wiser. Frequently, having passed the portals, they are 
ignored and neglected. Frequently they are disparaged as being 
only children ; as if their salvation were a matter of minor im- 
portance. Frequently cruel and devilish predictions are made that 
they will soon drift away. Frequently they are left alone, with- 
out counsel or sympathy, in their ignorance and risk, that it may 
be seen whether they will hold out. 

How many of us would be alive today if, when we were 
born into the world, and the nurse proposed to clothe and nourish 
us, our father had said, ' ' No ; never mind. It is a poor, puny, 
weak thing. It does not look as though it would live. Let it 
alone. If it lives and looks as if it would come to anything, we 
will get it some clothes and nourishment"? From what our 
parents say of us at our birth, some of us who are now hale and 
hearty men and women were, to begin with, about as insignifi- 
cant and unpromising specimens as ever wailed their way into the 
human family. If we are anything today, it is not because of 
our own accomplishments or attainment, either entirely or 
mainly, but because of what other ministries have wrought in 
our behalf. Few indeed are there who are self-made, either spir- 
itually or temporally, self-complacently as we sometimes claim to 
be self-made. Self-made men are not very often fully made. 
Take away what has come to us from others, directly or indi- 
rectly, and we are still in our swaddling clothes. Properly esti- 
mating our own indebtedness to the Church, and to the foster 
fathers and mothers who gave us counsel and sympathy in our 
spiritual infancy, let us show adequate interest in the babes in 
Christ. And if it was our lot to be born into the kingdom of the 
Son of God in the midst of a congregation more like an ice-house 
than a Christian church, let us see to it that our congregation is 
of warmer atmosphere. Let us see to it that children coming in 
among us have kindlier treatment. 

124 



The obligation is, of course, on the parents who are members 
of the Church ; and, if the parents are themselves Christians, I 
can not conceive how they can be careless. I can not conceive 
how they can be at ease a moment if their children are not con- 
stantly developing and maturing in the way of Life. For, if par- 
ents commence with their children in time, and themselves walk 
worthy of their vocation, they can hold them for Christ. O, 
fathers and mothers, keep yourselves free from the blood of the 
fruit of your parentage. 

The obligation is also on the ministers and officers of the 
Church. ' 4 Feed My lambs, " is the summons of the Chief Shep- 
herd to us. His under-shepherds, O, brothers and sisters, my 
comrades in the pastorate of this Church, let us not let one little 
lamb be lost from the nock which God hath purchased with His 
own blood, and over which He hath made us overseers. 

And the obligation is also on all the members of the Church. 
In the home where all is as it ought to be, everybody takes care 
of the baby. It ought to be thus in the family of God. The 
obligations of members of benevolent orders to help their fellow- 
members, are light as air in comparison with the obligations of 
Christians to watch over one another in love. When members of 
these orders who are also members of the Church, and who I 
know never lend a hand to build up other Christians and help 
them in their spiritual needs, tell me about sitting up with the sick 
of the lodge to which they belong, I say to myself, "This ye 
ought to have done, but ye ought not to have left the other 
undone. ' ' 

A long step in the right direction will be taken, if every 
member of the Church will be ready and willing to adopt a pro- 
bationer, immediately upon the enrolment of his name. Adop- 
tion is taking somebody else's child as our own, and watching it 
with a father's and a mother's solicitude. Now, as one applies 
for admission, let some brother or sister ask to have the applicant 
assigned to his or her care — agreeing for a year to care for and 
instruct and lead him. The applicant need not be informed of 

125 



the special assignment ; but the supervision ought to be close and 
loving. They who claim to want to work for the Lord would 
here have ample opportunity, and would bless themselves as well 
as save others. A body of members would thus be developed in 
this congregation, surpassing in Christian character and force any 
body of members the congregation has ever known. A very few 
years would suffice to show the value of the experiment so clearly 
that it would be no longer an experiment. For year after year 
you have had ingatherings, and multitudes have had their names 
written on the registers ; and yet how much stronger are you in 
spiritual number or power than twenty years ago ? Hosts can be 
found who began their religious life at these altars, who prove to 
have been still-born. Left neglected where they were born, they 
have perished. Now, for one year, let us look after all new 
births, meaning, with the help of God, that they shall live ; and 
let us see if we can not, at once, largely lessen the rate of spirit- 
ual mortality. O that we may be a Church full of nursing fathers 
and mothers ! 

A family is a hell where every one is only for himself — where 
the larger ones have no concern for the smaller ones ; where the 
father is always howling at the little child, " Don't bother me" ; 
and the mother is always screaming ' ' Get out of my way ' • ; 
and the older children are always yelling their impatience. And 
an earthly home is a heaven begun below where each looks on the 
things of the other — where the father is considerate, and the 
mother is loving, and the children are to each other as lovers. 
Such a home ought a Christian congregation to be — building each 
other up into all godliness, helping each other in all necessity, 
and sympathizing with each other in all sorrow : the stronger 
bearing the burdens of the weaker, and the weaker doing their 
best to bear their own burdens. 

The angels in Heaven have glad charge of the little ones — 
little both in age and in experience — who are the children of our 
Father in Heaven. Christ cries, "Suffer little children to come 
unto Me ; " declares, " Of such is the Kingdom of Heaven ; " 

126 



and proclaims, ' ' Whoso shall offend one of these little ones which 
believe in Me, it were better for him that a millstone were hanged 
about his neck, and that he were drowned in the depth of the sea. ' ' 
It is all well enough to earnestly and frequently sing : 

" More love to Thee, O Christ, 

More love to Thee ! 
Hear Thou the prayer I make 

On bended knee : 
This is my earnest plea, 
More love, O Christ, to Thee, 

More love to Thee ! " 

But Christ responds, ' ' By this shall all men know that ye are My 
disciples, if ye have love one to another." It is all well enough 
to welcome big people, learned people, rich people, to the com- 
munion of the saints, if they mean to be saints ; and if they do 
not, they had better not be welcomed in. But Christ calls a little 
child, and sets him in our midst, and says, " Whoso shall receive 
one such little child in My name, receiveth Me." 

Now and then a little child asks to come in among us, and 
some are on our roll. Let us, like Simeon, take them up in our 
arms, and teach them the fear of the Lord, and train them in the 
way they should go ; and so turn ourselves into a fuller likeness 
of Him Who enjoins on Peter, as the first proof of his conver- 
sion, "Feed My lambs." 



127 



XIV. 

"Thy shoes shall be iron and brass; and as thy days, so shall thy 
strength be."— Deuteronomy, 33 :25. 

At last the time for Moses to die has come. In the allotment 
of Providence, he is not to lead the Israelites through the waters 
of Jordan and settle amid the delights of Canaan. His care and 
responsibility are to be laid aside before the people, who have so 
long taken the law of Jehovah from his mouth, have escaped the 
marches and struggles of their pilgrimage and forgotten the diffi- 
culties of pursuit in the successes of possession. Indeed, he has 
already received the summons to disrobe himself of his charge, and 
take himself to the heights of Nebo. In obedience to the sum- 
mons, he assembles the people whom he has so assiduously and 
tenderly carried in his bosom for nearly half a century, and 
whose good fortune he has so steadily preferred to his own ; and 
he declares to them his farewell advice, and gives them his fare- 
well benediction. 

In the first place, he calls to their memory the bountiful good- 
ness of the Lord through all their history — in their exodus, their 
provision, and their protection — ; and then pronounces upon each 
tribe a special blessing : the blessing being not alone expressive of 
his concern and interest, but also, in an eminent sense, prophetic 
of the tribe's character and outcome in future years. 

In the sentence under review, he declares the portion of 
Asher — predicting that it will not easily fail in excellence ; that it 
will grow stronger and stronger ; and that beneath the snows of 
old age it will retain the glee and vigor of youth. 

Scripture, however, is written for all men and all times : for, 
whatever was the conception of its writers, in the enunciation of 
the promises which gladdened and sustained the saints of their own 
era, those promises were meant by their Divine Giver for all who 
should be in similar circumstances in all periods. It may have 
been that the vision of Moses reached not beyond the tribes 
thronging his i mm ediate presence ; and that, in addressing to 

128 



Asher the words, "As thy days, so shall thy strength be," he 
thought ouly of Asher ; but He Who inspired Moses looked in the 
face of all following generations, and meant the precious syllables 
for the cheer and stay of all who would in coming ages commit 
themselves to His keeping in well-doing. He meant them for you 
and me, as well as for Asher. He meant that they should mean 
more to you and me than they meant to Asher. 

They assure us that we, following on to know the I^ord, shall 
have all the strength we need. Beyond all question, humanity is 
insufficient for itself. By ourselves we can achieve what is best 
neither for the life that is nor for the life that is to come. If we 
enjoy well-being here or hereafter, it is all of the grace and work 
of God. It is all through the atonement of our Lord Jesus 
Christ. But our well-being is not in default of our own diligent 
concurrence. It is not in spite of ourselves. Neither is it by mere 
acceptance of what is Divinely given. We are to be laborers to- 
gether with God. While He works in us to will and to do of His 
own good pleasure, we are to work out our own salvation with fear 
and trembling in His sight. Whatever we can do in our own in- 
terest, we must do. What we can not do for ourselves, will be 
done for us. Where our own concern and resources fail us, 
Heaven is pledged to our support. 

It is pledged to assist us in the discernment of our obligation 
— being to us eyes, while we are threading the wilderness ; dis- 
closing the path that we should take, while we are halting at 
cross-roads ; and showing us the way, when shadows enfold both 
in front and in the rear, both to the left and to the right. 

It is pledged to assist us in the discharge of our duty. What- 
ever demand may address us, whether of God or of others or of 
ourselves, we shall be adequate to its observance. Whatever sta- 
tion may call us to its occupancy, we shall be equal to the sum- 
mons. With Omnipotence at our right hand, we will be able to 
go up and possess the land, and we will always be ready to run 
our race. 

It is pledged to assist us in the endurance of tribulation. 

129 



Christianity, indeed, confers no exemption from the ills incident 
to probationary scenes. It rather intensifies and multiplies them. 
Nevertheless, it leaves us not to fight them alone and single- 
handed. It thrusts us not unaccompanied and uncovered into the 
storm. If we are cast into a den of lions, we will find the mon- 
sters changed into our friends, and their manes formed into pillows 
for our aching heads. If we are consigned to the furnace, we 
will find One like unto the Son of Man keeping us company, and 
we will go out without the smell of fire upon our garments. If 
we are thrown into raging rivers, with nothing but a boat of 
bulrushes between us and death, kind winds will drift us ashore, 
and furnish us with friends and supplies. In every temptation a 
way will open for our escape. With every trial there will be grace 
to bear it, and grace to turn the trial into triumph. 

The words of the text imply, however, that we will have no 
more strength than we need — that we will have none to spare. It 
is an announcement of Inspiration that the righteous are scarcely 
saved — no more than saved. It is the averment of the Son of 
God Himself that, when we have done all that we are com- 
manded, we are unprofitable servants — entitled to neither com- 
pensation nor thanks, and without claim on our Master for 
remuneration, except by His own gracious engagement to those 
who enter His service and lay themselves out for the glorification 
of His Name. Moreover, these declarations apply to all. It is 
arrogant and impious to talk or think of works of supererogation 
— to even dream of doing more than our duty, and so depositing 
in the vaults of the future a fund on which we may draw in behalf 
of those who are less righteous, or in favor of ourselves in subse- 
quent failure. Nor is it only a deluded Romanist who leans on 
this notion of works of supererogation. Everyone who attempts 
less than what, in the light of the Divine Oracles and Providence 
and Spirit, he sees to be his duty, practically fondles the same 
heresy. His remissness may come of his covetousness, or of his 
cowardice, or of his indolence, or of his pride, or of his wrath. 
His plea in self- justification may be his former contributions and 

130 



services, or the pressure of other claims, or the withholding by 
other people of their dues. Still, by doing less than he can do, 
he virtually asserts that his capacity is not the measure of his 
obligation, concedes the possibility of his rendering larger service, 
and denies the right of the Lord of all to every service he can 
pay. 

The Lord of all confers no more endowments than He means 
to be cultivated, no more strength than He means to be improved, 
no more talents than He means to be laid out. H e confers no 
more grace than He means to be used, nor than He regards neces- 
sary to help us make our calling and election sure. 

We have none to waste in dreams or speculations about 
things which are too high for us — in baseless conjectures about the 
past, or in fruitless efforts concerning the present, or in idle 
studies of the future. 

We have none to waste in loiterings by the way — in absence 
from the means of grace, or in forgetful ness of the claims of God 
and humanity, or in rest in the shade. 

We have none to waste in quarrels with our biethren — in 
relation to conduct or creed, or faith or form, or method or motive. 

And we have none to waste in rashness — in going on forbid- 
den ground, or risking temptation, or trying how near we can 
venture to hell without falling in. 

Verily, we have no strength to waste, but only what our 
necessities require. Every one of us is burdened with demands 
equal to all our capital, and impressing every hour of our lives ; 
and these obligations call for the enlistment of all our affections, 
the expenditure of all our energies, and the outlay of all our re- 
sources. Over the delinquent crash appalling denunciations. 
"Curse ye Meroz." "To him that knoweth to do good, and 
doeth it not, to him it is sin." " Woe to them that are at ease in 
Zion. ' ' And over the diligent gleam exceeding great and pre- 
cious promises. " Be thou faithful unto death, and I will give 
thee a crown of life." " In due season we shall reap, if we faint 
not. " " Say ye to the righteous, that it shall be well with him.'* 

131 



And the words of this declaration promise that, being faith- 
ful in that which is little as well as in that which is much, we 
shall have strength as we need it. As has already appeared in 
this discussion, not merely is there no possibility of exceeding our 
duty, so as to have merit to spare for others, but there is also no 
possibility of gathering by our present diligence a supply on 
which we may fall back in delinquencies of later times. Each 
current hour brings its own demands. Each new sunrise reveals 
new obligations and necessities. We can not today do the work 
of tomorrow. 

It is equally impossible for us to possess ourselves of strength 
anterior to its need. Certainly, we have ample reason to expect 
from Him Whom we serve whatever supplies are requisite for such 
service as He requires ; but we have no reason to expect such sup- 
plies before we need them. He thinks it best to have us realize 
our daily dependence — to have us remember that in Him we 
"live, and move, and have our being"; and, therefore, He 
makes each moment the purveyor of its own supplies. It is a 
manner of the Divine administration that we see illustrated in the 
way in which ancient Israel received its manna, which had to be 
gathered every day. We also see it illustrated in the Lord's 
prayer, as, taught by Him, we say, " Give us this day our daily 
bread" — not bread for yesterday: its necessities are gone; not 
bread for tomorrow : its necessities do not yet task us, and we 
may not live to see it. Today we only need today's bread. And 
we may look for strength only as we need it. 

It is neither righteous nor wise to borrow trouble — to begloom 
ourselves with apprehensions, or to faint at imaginary woes, or to 
make ourselves wretched by fears of an unknown future. But 
how common is such carriage. Endeavoring to look ahead, re- 
calling the constancy of the martyrs in the opening years of the 
Christian Church, the devotion of the saints in the fires of Papal 
persecution, the fidelity of the people of God in the grasp of ter- 
rible ordeals, and the steadfastness of the righteous in the midst 
of staggering storms of temptation, we write bitter things against 

132 



ourselves. We fear that we could not stand the stress, and that 
beneath such pressure we would be found wanting. There is no 
justification for these imaginations. Along with the day will come 
its furnishment. With the need will come the supply. 

Occasionally we ponder the possibility of losing our estate or 
friends or health or life or reputation ; and we shudder at the out- 
look, concluding that we can not endure the furnace, and, there- 
fore, doubting our Christianity. But the fact is, we have no busi- 
ness with either such fancies or such reflections. Our current 
business is to enjoy and use what possessions we have. If we do 
our duty today, we will not be found lacking tomorrow. If we 
are faithful in the employment of the grace we have, more will be 
forthcoming when more is wanted. With every occasion will 
develop its sufficiency. If our estate depart, we will take joyfully 
the spoiling of our goods, knowing that in Heaven we have a 
better and enduring substance. If our friends die, we will chant 
the patriarchal refrain, " The Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken 
away ; blessed be the name of the Lord ; " and we will exult in 
the hope of a reunion where parting is unknown. If our health 
fail, we will feel that " Jehovah is the strength of our heart, and 
our portion for ever " ; and we will glorify Jehovah in the furnace. 
If our reputation goes, we will lean on the Arm Everlasting, and 
cry, • ' Thou knowest I am not wicked." If sorrows smite us, 
we will fix our eyes on the invisible, and shout, ' ' All things 
work together for good to them that love God. " If the summons 
to the tomb strikes its knell, we will reply, " I am ready to be 
offered " ; ' * I have fought a good fight " ; " Thou wilt show me 
the path of life." 

Assuring and sustaining as is the announcement of our con- 
sideration, it is not the only announcement which calls to us out 
of the firmament of Revelation. From out of the same glowing 
sky come, ravishing as the song of the morning stars, the aver- 
ments, "God is love" ; "He careth for you" ; "I am with 
thee " ; "I will strengthen thee ; yea, I will help thee ; yea, I 
will uphold thee with the right hand of My righteousness ' ' ; 

133 



1 ' My grace is sufficient for thee " ; " Nothing in the universe 
shall harm you, if ye be followers of that which is good." 

Besides, the annals of the Church are crowded with the narra- 
tives of instances in which these Divine averments have been 
proven true. Enoch walked with God ; he had the testimony that 
he pleased God ; and then, without dying, he was charioted into 
the opening skies. Moses feared to essay the leadership of Israel, 
and looked on every hand for escape ; but he gave himself to his 
mission, had the help of Omnipotence, and won such pre-eminence 
that the world was without his peer until the Son of God came 
down to be his successor. Peter, when really in no danger, was 
so afraid of dying that the idle gabble of a servant girl scared him 
almost to death ; but when he was really called to die, he was so 
wonderfully sustained that he fairly leaped to his cross. 

From the storehouse of our own individual experience we can 
bring numerous illustrations of the doctrine of our discussion. 
Halting in the face of duty, we have found our backs adequate 
to the burden. Shrinking in front of obstacles, we have found a 
path around or a way over. Trembling in the presence of trial, 
we have found deliverance or sufficiency or triumph ; and, recall- 
ing our affliction, we now shout, " Thanks be to God Who giveth 
us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ." 

It shall be in the future as it was in the past. Cleaving to 
the Lord with full purpose of heart, doing His commandments, 
hoping for His appearing, "As thy days, so shall thy strength 
be" — the arms of thy hands shall be made strong by the hands 
of the mighty God of Jacob. The grace of Omnipotence shall be 
thy unfailing refuge and sufficiency. Across every cloud shall be 
hung the bow of promise. Around every darkness shall be bound 
an edging of light. In every furnace the Son of Man shall be 
found walking by thy side. On every storm-swept water thy 
Saviour shall be seen, treading the billows into peace, and turning 
them into a smiling highway upon which thy unsinking feet shall 
carry thee safely ashore. 

Lo, Asher's God is our God, and God's covenant with him 

134 



whispers in our ear all its fulness of comfort and inspiration. A 
wilderness is our way to the land of promise ; enemies look for 
us from behind every tree ; and stones and thorns strew all the 
way. But, as we enter, God cries, ' ' My presence shall go with 
thee, and I will give thee rest ;" as often as our torn and weary 
feet fear to try farther travel, He cries, M Thy shoes shall be iron 
and brass ; ' ' and as often as our anxious hearts halt lest our load 
be heavier than we can carry, He cries, "As thy days, so shall 
thy strength be." While, from the bending eternities, holding 
us in full survey, the hosts who have gone over the way before 
us cry, " Not one thing hath failed of all the good things which 
the Lord our God hath spoken :" "The word of the Lord endur- 
eth for ever." 

" Nor will our days of toil be long : 

Our pilgrimage will soon be trod ; 
And we shall join the ceaseless song— 

The endless Sabbath of our God." 



135 



XV. 

" Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow ; they toil not, neither 
do they spin." — Matthew, 6:28. 

A full, impressive, suggestive discourse is that famous deliv- 
erance on the mount, in the neighborhood of Capernaum — a 
Galilean hill the pulpit, He who spake as man never spake the 
orator, and the kingdom which is to absorb and outlast and out- 
rank every other kingdom the topic. 

Admonishing His hearers against excessive care for this life, 
and enjoining supreme concern for the life to come, and illuminat- 
ing His argument with illustrations gathered from the fields oi 
Grace and Law and Providence, the Divine Speaker now gleans 
from the fields of Nature. Early Spring, in that climate a brief 
but enchanting season, enrobes the land of the Covenant. 
Kvery where anemone and crocus and lily, as far as the eye can 
carry, are in full bloom ; and everywhere there hails the eye a 
scene of surpassing loveliness. His eye drinks in the fragrant 
beauty, and His soul revels in the lessons of the glowing land- 
scape. For, within His all-comprehending gaze open not only 
the faces of the abounding flowers, but also their very hearts. 
To Him they have not only a natural, but also a religious side. To 
Him they speak not only of the excellence of the Creator in all 
His creations, but also of the interest of the Creator in all His 
creations. To Him they talk not only of their own brilliant charms, 
but also of His charms whose fiat invested them with all their 
attractions, and the far-away sight of Whose own transcendent 
glory stirred the entranced prophet into the cry, ' ' How great is 
His beauty !" To Him they talk not only of their own gay garb, 
but also of His goodness 

" Who, not content 
With every food of life to nourish man, 
By kind illusions of the wondering sense, 
Dost make all nature beauty to his eye, 
Or music to his ear." 

Pausing in the presence of this sea of bloom, swelling all 

136 



around, and wishing to lift His hearers through the seen up into 
the unseen, He exclaims, Consider these lilies — their color and 
form and structure ; see how they grow — how free from all anxiety 
about their appearance and impression and sustenance ; see how 
confidingly they content themselves with their appointed lot, 
drink in the generous ministries of land and sky, fill their own 
humble circle of being, keep the laws of their own organism, and let 
God take care of them ; see how fully and how royally He does 
take care of them. Solomon, in all his glory, was not arrayed 
like one of these. Never a costumer or modiste sent out such a 
combination or fit or style as adorns yon lily. 

Then, appearance is something. It does have something to 
do with one's success. It does help or hinder in the race of life. 
It is to be considered in the consideration of ourselves. It is 
happier and holier and wiser to go decently than to go frowsy. 
The appearance, however, is not the chief end of man ; and 
supreme concern for appearance misses its own end, as well as the 
chief end of man; The way to appear well is to seek, before and 
beyond all else, to be and to do well. Be yourself; do not give 
yourself to the imitation of others ; study your own personality 
in body, mind and soul ; and dress accordingly. Take the meas- 
ure of yourself as you have been fashioned and located, and take 
pains to observe the conditions of your fashion and location, and 
your seeming will take care of itself. 

The lilies of the day of the Great Teacher among the chil- 
dren of men are no longer in bloom ; but, being dead, they have 
immortality in the lessons drawn from their beauty and uncon- 
cern in the Sermon on the Mount. It is, however, our own season 
of flowers ; and everywhere they feast our sense and read their 
lessons to our souls. 

By the appointment of the Fount of all being, flowers have 
their being. Easily enough we admit that angels, bending about 
the throne of Infinite Lordship, and busy on celestial errands 
through all the provinces of the universe, are of exalted origin ; 
and that men who, even amid the limitations of the great primal 

137 



lapse, are only a little beneath the angels in endowment and 
majesty, are the children of Him Who is from everlasting to ever- 
lasting ; and that the worlds which crowd the realms of space, 

" For ever singing as they shine, 
The hand that made us is Divine," 

are sprung from the same superhuman Source ; and that all are of 
Divine arrangement ; and that the work is worthy of the Work- 
man. 

Flowers, however, — what mission or use have they? It is 
true they dress prettily, and smell sweetly ; but you can not make 
out of them clothing or food or shelter. You can not make out of 
them dwellings or factories or railroads. It is true that children 
adore them, and lovers fancy them, and women love them ; but of 
what worth are they to us men ? Of what worth are they to us 
lords of creation for whom the earth and the heavens were made, 
and without reference to whom nothing was made that is made ? 
So, practically, if not theoretically, we count flowers and every- 
thing else which we can not eat or drink or employ in speculation 
— which we are too clumsy or lazy or stupid to utilize — out of the 
handiwork of Him in Whom we live and move and have our be- 
ing. For all this, He Who called the angels into existence, and 
fashioned man, and sowed the sky with stars, made the flowers. 
All things were made by Him, and without Him was not anything 
made that is made. Closing up His creation of earth and heaven, 
He pronounced it good — the counterpart of His design, the ex- 
pression of His ideal, the realization of His will. Nothing is un- 
worthy of its Maker — 

" There is in Nature nothing mean, or base, 
Only as our baseness makes it so- 
Making that common by the sight, or touch, 
Which, if as distant as the stars, would 
Seem as sacred and as marvellous as they." 

By the Fount of their being, the flowers are enrobed with 
their beauty. Among many there is no exalted estimate of 
beauty. They consider it at best as only an advertisement or 
ornament, and as entirely wanting in character and value. They 

138 



consider hat the size of things is their importance and precious 
ness — that the doing or having of a thing is all there is of it, and 
that the manner of the achievement or exercise is of no moment. 
Indeed, they rather pride themselves on their own blunt and 
graceless methods of action, snarling, ''There's no style about 
us," as if style were an unmanliness, or vice, or weakness, not to 
be condoned. 

But the Former of all things has made every thing beautiful 
in its time. He could have fashioned the earth without flowers, 
and the firmament without stars. He could have formed the blos- 
soms and leaves all alike in color, and the branches all of one 
stiff pattern, and all as fit as now for food and fuel and manufac- 
ture. He, however, cares for the beauty, as well as for the utility 
of things. He feasts the eye, as well as fills the hand, of the 
pensioner upon His bounty. He discloses Himself, both in 
Nature and in Revelation, as the God of all grace — grace being 
not merely benevolence or mercy or pity, but also His gentle, 
royal, winning way of being benevolent or merciful or pitiful. 

It is, then, neither unmanliness nor vice nor weakness in us 
to admire the beautiful, and to seek to be beautiful ourselves in 
person and in way. His manner, indeed, in the accomplishment 
of His designs, and in the dispensation of His gifts, calls for our 
grateful appreciation, and summons us to resemblance in all we do 
or say or think. Many a church would be better filled, if more 
attractively fitted up, and more regardful in its members of the 
Christian courtesy due to each other and to the strangers within 
their gates. Many a family would be more happy and honored, 
if more careful of the arrangements of the home, however humble, 
and more cultured in the decencies of conduct. Many a laborer 
would enjoy larger custom and income, if his deportment were 
more genteel. Many a toiler for Christ would have more sheaves 
to show for his mission among the children of men, if he carried 
more heart in his hand, more sunshine in his eye, and more sweet- 
ness in his voice. 

It must not be forgotten that beauty appertains not only to 

139 



persons, but also to things, and to the manners of persons and 
things ; and that it is a large part of both the godliness and power 
of things. Bishop McKendree, after a long day's ride in the mud 
and rain, late in the evening, soaked and soiled, reaches the house 
of a member of the Church rather noted for his uncleanly and 
uncouth habits. On the next morning — the morning of the Sab- 
bath — the Bishop, his boots and clothing being too wet for black- 
ing and brushing on the previous evening, is arranging himself 
for decent appearance in the house of the L,ord. The host re- 
bukes his guest for doing such work on the Sabbath. The guest 
replies, ' ' I always endeavor to do all I can on Saturday to pre- 
pare myself for the Sabbath ; but I do not believe that it is as sin- 
ful to clean up on Sabbath as it is to go to church dirty." There 
is a Divine injunction, " Let all things be done decently, and in 
order " ; and another, " Put on thy beautiful garments, O Jeru- 
salem ' ' ; and another, ' ' Worship the Lord in the beauty ot 
holiness. " 

"All are architects of Fate, 

Working in these walls of Time — 
Some with massive deeds, and great, 

Some with ornaments and rhyme. 
Nothing useless is, or low, 

Each thing in its place is best : 
And what seems but idle show 

Strengthens and supports the rest." 

By the laws of their being, the beauty of the flowers is ot 
their own working out. Evolution has its sphere in the economy 
of the universe : but as an agent of the Supreme Being, and not 
as His rival or substitute. Evolution is merely His minion, and 
must work at His bidding, and in harmony with His laws, and 
under His supervision. He fashions the first seed, and gives it 
the origination of other seed in its own image and likeness. His 
providence drops the seed amid congenial conditions, and girdles 
it with propitious influences. In order, however, to the flower, 
the seed must appropriate its conditions and influences ; avail it- 
self of the corresponding elements of earth and sea and sky ; 
duly fit them into its own organism ; form them, this into color, 

140 



this into style, this into substance ; and thus evolve all into flower. 
See the lilies of the field, how they grow — not by consuming care, 
or grinding labor, or toilsome spinning ; but by abiding in their 
estate, improving their opportunities, and leaving the issue in the 
keeping of the Ruler of all. 

It is thus that man comes to manhood. Creative appoint- 
ment brings him into being, and endows him with supplies ; but 
man must improve his supplies, and so make himself a man. It 
any will not work, neither shall he eat. Divine grace creates 
man anew ; forms Christ within him the hope of glory ; and gives 
him the Divine ordinances and Scriptures and Spirit ; but man 
must grow into redeemed manhood in diligent, humble, prayerful 
exercise unto all godliness. Gracious, supernatural influences 
only accomplish his perfection as he goes on unto perfection. 
Real Christian character and life are no investment from without, 
but are a growth from within : as the dress and fragrance and 
fruit of the flowers have come not from external touching up by 
heat and light and moisture, but from the incorporation of heat 
and light and moisture into their own substance. The infallible 
oracles cry, " Blessed is the man that trusteth in the Lord, and 
whose hope the Lord is : for he shall be as a tree planted by the 
waters, and that spreadeth out his roots by the river ; and he shall 
not fear when heat cometh ; frut his leaf shall be green ; and he 
shall not be careful in the year of drought ; neither shall he cease 
from yielding fruit." 

" Thus the men 
Whom Nature's works can charm, with God Himself 
Hold converse : grow familiar, day by day, 
With His conceptions ; act upon His plan ; 
And form to His the relish of their souls." 

Flowers, evanescent and fragile as they are, have a mission in 
the world. Kvery creation or ordination or permission of Infinite 
Supremacy proposes the accomplishment of an appointed end ; and 
that end is not merely its own perfection and satisfaction, but also 
the perfection and satisfaction of the entire system of which it is 
a part. Nothing in all the amplitude of the universe is fashioned 

141 



only for itself. Selfishness is an intrusion in the universe. 
Whether of the animal or mineral or vegetable kingdom, each 
element or fraction or unit is a part of one stupendous whole. 
Flowers bloom not only for their own enjoyment or honor or profit, 
nor waste their fragrance on the desert air. They are for the 
praise of their Maker, and for the weal of man. They are the 
agents of their Maker in the cleansing of the atmosphere, in the 
development of the means of subsistence, and in the preservation 
of life ; and they thus magnify His name. They minister to both 
human sense and human soul, supplying both food and gladness 
to man ; and thus they are to him both a beauty and a joy for 
ever. 

For each individual flower there is an appointed mission. 
Each is individually conditioned and individually delegated ; and, 
failing in its task, its birth is a miscarriage, its business is a mis- 
management, and its life is a waste. He, among men, misses, 
then, the excellence of the flower, as well as his own errand and 
possibility, who cultivates only his own appearance and interest. 
Even more grandly conditioned and dowered than the lily of the 
field, his is a sublimer and wider circle of being. Fetching his 
lineage in body and heart and mind from God, like God in reason 
and taste and will, master of the laws and resources and springs 
of Nature, potent to rally reinforcements from the armies of 
Omnipotence, and with eternal aeons and infinite spaces for the 
elaboration and working out of his plans, how broad his chance : 
how high his destiny, and how solemn his responsibility ! Made 
and qualified to be the agent and fellow of God, to fashion him- 
self into a child and heir of God, and to form his family into a 
household of God ; made and qualified to elevate his community 
into the Church of Christ, to gather his nation into the fold of 
Christ, and to lift his world into the kingdom of Christ ; made and 
qualified to help make all men see what is the fellowship of the 
mystery which from the beginning of the world hath been hid in 
God, Who created all things by Jesus Christ, to the intent that 
now unto the principalities and powers in heavenly places might 

142 



be known by the Church the manifold wisdom of God, according 
to the eternal purpose which He purposed in Christ Jesus : how 
terrible his undoing whose only tribute to his Lord and Redeemer 
is in the song, 

" Nothing, either great or small, 
Remains for me to do ! " 

To every human being there is a work, his work ; and, leav- 
ing it undone, Christ is delayed on His march to the inheritance of 
the heathen, earth is held back from its second Eden, hell robs 
Heaven of its rightful possession, and the miserable idler rushes 
to a ruin whose depths can be measured only by the heights he 
might have won. None of us liveth to himself: for whether we 
live, we live unto the Lord ; and whether we die, we die unto the 
Lord : whether we live, therefore, or die, we are the Lord's. Woe 
to him who can be at ease, who can fold his hands, or who can 
think only of his own fortune, while from far and near, and from 
within and without, earnest voices cry, 

" Work, for the night is coming, 

Work through the morning hours ; 
Work while the dew is sparkling, 

Work 'mid springing flowers : 
Work when the day grows brighter ; 

Work in the glowing sun : 
Work, for the night is coming, 

When man's work is done." 

God, Maker and Monarch of all being, takes care of the 
flowers. Appointing their being, assigning their lot, and decree- 
ing their mission, His eye is ever on their need and His hand is 
ever over them with supplies. Nothing bars them from His con- 
sideration. The brevity of their life, and the insignificance of 
their work in comparison with the work of other creatures of His 
creation, shut them not out from His notice and provision. They 
share His concern as fully as the planets which go wheeling 
through the skies. 

Even a single lily is His ward. His admiration and interest 
are not reserved for a field of lilies: "Solomon in all his glory 

143 



was not arrayed like one of these ' ' — how deep, loving and particu- 
lar the tenderness implied in the phrase ' ' like one of these ! ' ' 
Look ! each is a distinct entity, has a distinct form, and lives to a 
distinct end ; for each the atmosphere is composed, the dew is 
distilled, and the sunshine fitted ; for each the earth is balanced, 
and the heaven tempered ; for each the entire system of Nature 
is adjusted and ordered, that each may find its own fashion and 
fragrance and tint, live its own life, and reach its own end. 

Humanity is of more value than that whole field of lilies, for 
one of which all Nature spins and toils. The loss of a lily is 
merely the loss of a life brief at the longest, and the overthrow of 
matter which would soon be rebuilt in other forms. The loss of 
a man would be the loss of a life dowered with the breath of God, 
fashioned in the image of God, healed of sin in the blood of God, 
inhabited by the Spirit of God, and on its way to the throne of 
God, to sit by the side of God, " throughout all ages, world with- 
out end." If in one man is all the fulness of God — declaring 
certain features of the character and government of God more 
clearly, enjoying communion with God more fully, and showing 
forth the praise of God more impressively, than is within th e 
reach of any other earthly organism, — how closely he must lie to 
the heart of God ! And if God covers with so helpful and tender 
a solicitude a lily of the field, of so brief a being, and of so hum- 
ble a lot, how lovingly and minutely He must enfold with His 
gentlest and richest ministries the man who is begotten again in 
His own likeness, whose life is hidden with Christ in God, and 
upon whose outcome such momentous issues are staked ! ' ' God 
that made the world, and all things therein, seeing that He is God 
of Heaven and earth, dwelleth not in temples made with hands ; 
neither is worshipped with men's hands as though He needed 
anything, seeing He giveth to all life and breath and all things ; 
and hath made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell upon 
the face of the earth ; and hath determined the times before ap- 
pointed, and the bounds of their habitations; that they should 
seek the Lord, if haply they might feel after Him, and find Him, 

144 



though He be not far from every one of us ; for in Him we live 
and move and have our being. ' ' 

" Which of the monarchs of the earth 

Can boast a guard like ours — 
Encircled from our second birth 

With all the Heavenly powers ? 

"Angels, where'er we go, attend 

Our steps, whate'er betide : 
With watchful care their charge defend, 

And evil turn aside. 

" And when our spirits we resign, 

On outstretched wings they bear, 
And lodge us in the arms Divine, 

And leave us ever there." 

Each, then, bear in mind his own individuality, and conse- 
quent individual burden, and consequent individual responsibility 
— each being himself : each counting one in every business or 
company or struggle to which he gives his name, and ever scorn- 
ing to be a cipher, as he would scorn to be rated a fool or a knave. 

Bach bear in mind that every unit is part of a whole ; and 
that each unit is in intimate relations with his community, and 
with the fortunes of the entire community, and with the outcome 
of the universe. If ever we feel despair or lethargy stealing over 
us, let us each stir himself with the recollection that failure of 
the part imperils the success of the whole system — that whether 
one member suffer, all the members suffer with it ; or one member 
be honored, all the members rejoice with it. 

Each carry himself for the best within his reach. Anything 
worth doing at all is worth doing well. To do his best is due to 
himself, that in the exercise he may grow toward the best, and 
that he may not be ashamed to look his works in the face, and 
that he may receive a full reward : for every genuine man covets 
perfection. 

Each cultivate appearances. If they accomplish nothing 
more, they give access and win a chance. Look your best ; and 
others will expect your best ; and you, discerning their expecta- 
tions in their eyes, will do your best. Then, the appearance of 

145 



things is a part of things — the manner of the work is part of the 
work. The coat is not only to cover, but also to fit. 

Each give flowers to those you touch in the intercourse of 
life. They help beautify and sweeten life. Do not fear that 
pleasant recognition of others will spoil them. They who do well 
have a right to due recognition ; and the lavishing of flowers at 
their funeral does not pay for their previous withholdment. In a 
western city a man died who had been well at the front in busi- 
ness and society ; but, because of a change of fortune, he had for 
some time been coldly treated by many who had been intimate 
with him while he had favors to bestow. On the occasion of his 
funeral, in atonement of their neglect, they were profuse in their 
gifts of flowers ; and his wife, approaching to take her leave of 
the beloved form, while the house was thronged with those in 
attendance, sobbed out, " O, why could you not have given him 
some of these flowers while he was alive ? ' ' The way of life 
would be smoother and sunnier, if we brought fewer flowers for 
the dead, and gave more to the living. This service would not be 
lost if it sent us out to carry ourselves more kindly to those with 
whom we come in contact from time to time. The Christ from 
Whom we take our name, Christian, went about doing good ; and 
never are we so like Him as when we are scattering kindness. 

Each leave the keeping of himself, in well-doing, in the keep- 
ing of God. Consider the lilies, how He cares for them, and 
what he makes out of them ; and see how He must care for you, 
and what He wills to make out of your more royal nature. 

Each harken to His voice, " Lo, I am with you alway, even 
unto the end of the world " ; give to the winds your fears ; and 
go on your way rejoicing — being to others what He is to you. 

" Always with us, always with us:— 

Words of cheer and words of love ; 
Thus the risen Saviour whispers, 

From His dwelling-place above. 
With us when we toil in sadness, 

Sowing much, and reaping none ; 
Telling us that in the future 

Golden harvests shall be won. 

146 



With us when the storm is sweeping 

O'er our pathway dark and drear ; 
Waking hope within our bosoms, 

Stilling every anxious fear. 
With us in the lonely valley, 

When we cross the chilling stream 
lighting up the steps to glory 

With salvation's radiant beam." 



147 



XVI. 

" When ye come together therefore into one place, this is not to eat the 
Lord's Supper." — I Corinthians, 11 : 20. 

A form may continue long after the design of its establish- 
ment has ceased to be its animation and direction : yea, long after 
its observance has degenerated into alien and sinful practices. 

And so, among the Corinthians, within half a century after 
the ascension of the Son of Man, the Feast which He instituted to 
fasten the Church which He had purchased with His own blood to 
a grateful and loving memory of Himself and of His oblation for 
undone humanity, and to hold it to the eager hope of His second 
coming, without sin unto salvation, and to keep in brotherly one- 
ness with each other all who are one in Him, has degenerated into 
a very degenerate sort of picnic. All still assemble professedly for 
its celebration ; but divisions and heresies declare themselves ; each 
person brings his own provision ; little clans club what they bring 
together, and go off by themselves to eat and drink ; and some 
give way to gluttony and intoxication, while some are left unsat- 
isfied. 

And, rebuking this hilarious and unbrotherly and un-Christly 
prostitution of the hallowed Feast, Paul writes, " When ye come 
together therefore into one place, this is not to eat the Lord's Sup- 
per. " Calling it the Lord's Supper, and gathering together at the 
regular place and time of its celebration, and going through with the 
prescribed ritual, you do not make it such. Along with all due 
forms and nomenclature and rites, there must be the spirit of its 
establishment. You must bear its Founder in affectionate and 
confiding and obedient remembrance, look for His return, and love 
each other even as He loves you. And the same rule obtains 
with all the ordinances of religion. Forms are an absolute neces- 
sity and requirement : and none has any claim for Christian char- 
acter who fails in Christian forms ; but they are meritorious and 
rewardable only as they are the impulse of Christian aspiration 
and belief and will. 

148 



Again we are assembled for our quarterly Communion. And 
it is most becomingly and forcibly thus denominated : for com- 
munion is fellowship one with another — the cordial concurrence 
of two or more in engagement and feeling and thought. And, 
participating in the privilege of this hour, we enjoy fellowship 
with Christ ; for we cultivate His mind, and keep His ordinance, 
and propose His glory ; and, so occupying ourselves, we have the 
testimony that we please Him : for, at one with Him, we have 
His obligation to manifest Himself unto us as He does not unto 
the world. And we have fellowship with each other : we are 
glad in each other's knowledge of the truth as it is in Jesus ; we 
each look kindly on the concerns of the other ; and we rejoice 
together in hope of the glory of God. 

And this Communion-season is Scripturally represented as a 
Supper. A supper, as originally and properly understood, is the 
last meal of the day ; and that was the time of the institution of 
this Feast, and of its first observance : for the record is, " Now 
when even was come, He was sitting at meat with the twelve 
disciples. . . And, as they were eating, Jesus took bread, and 
blessed it, and brake it, and gave it to the disciples, and said, 
Take, eat ; this is My body. And He took the cup, and gave 
thanks, and gave it to them, saying, Drink ye all of it ; for this 
is My blood of the New Testament, which is shed for many for 
the remission of sins. ' ' 

And I can not but believe that evening is the appropriate 
time for the celebration of the sacred Supper ; and that the con- 
trary custom is a departure, not only from the very idea of the 
Supper, but from the thought of the Founder in its establishment ; 
and that it is utteily without warrant from Holy Scripture. I 
farther believe that kneeling at the table is not a becoming pos- 
ture for its observance ; but that it is an innovation of Romanism in 
the interest of its dogma that " Not only is Christ as both God 
and man in the Sacrament of the Eucharist, and in every part of 
it, but the substances of bread and wine cease to exist after 
1 consecration ; ' ' ' and this innovation and perversion have been 

149 



entailed on Methodism, without due consideration by our fathers, 
through the Church of England, the daughter of Romanism and 
the mother of Methodism. Sitting at the table is our convenient 
and habitual custom ; and it was so when the Lord appointed the 
Holy Communion, except that each leaned somewhat toward his 
neighbor — indicating fellowship with each other, as well as indi- 
vidual repast. 

The evening meal is pre-eminently the meal of fellowship. 
Breakfast is essential and nourishing, after hours of abstinence, 
and in front oi impending labor. But we come to it called from 
inviting slumber, conning the demands of the day, hurriedly, in 
comparative dishabille, and oppressed with needful separation for 
hours from each other. Dinner, the mid -day meal, is necessary 
and supporting. But we come to it, a mere luncheon at a restau- 
rant or in solitude, fatigued, soiled, with a half-day's toil ahead of 
us, and with part of the family away from us. Supper hails us at 
the close of the day : labor's period expired ; our tools laid by ; 
and all the family is about the table, all cleanly dressed, and all 
full of incident ; and love sits enthroned ; and rest is coming. 
Yes, supper is the meal of fellowship and peace. 

And this Holy Communion is the Supper of our Lord Jesus 
Christ. He appoints it amid the shadows of His crucifixion, on 
the very eve of the oblation of Himself as the Lamb of God 
which taketh away the sin of the world, and with the weight of 
all the sins of all time pressing His soul. 

He arranges it in memory of Himself, and of the sacrifice of 
Himself for ruined manhood ; and in pledge of His return ; and 
in token of His present, as well as of His past and future, 
interest in all the interests of all who accept His mediation, and 
follow Him in the way of regeneration. 

He commands that all His disciples shall partake of this 
Feast ; for He gave it to them y and not to some of them, and 
said, " Drink ye all of it." And He commands that this shall be 
done to the end of time : for thus they show forth His death until 
He come again. It is an explicit commandment, and well nigh 

150 



the only test of membership in the visible Church of His declara- 
tion ; and its non-observance is perilous in the extreme. 

He clearly indicates that its observance shall be social : not 
by one's self, nor merely in one's own mind, but together. It is 
instituted by our Lord at a meeting of all the disciples ; and the 
symbols are dispensed to all ; and all partake ; and the Saviour 
promises to join with them in its hallowed engagement by and by 
in the kingdom of His Father. Nor can I doubt that, in the 
choice of supper — pre-eminently the social meal of the day, — our 
Lord had its social characteristics in mind, and meant the transfer 
of these characteristics to His Supper. 

And now the Supper is ready, and the summons is served ; 
and we, with the work of another quarter done, are gathering to 
the table — cleansing ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh and 
spirit, glad in our opportunity, and waiting for the Lord Jesus to 
seat Himself at the head of the table. 

And, bearing Him in mind, in His advent and life, and in 
His design in the institution of this Supper, and in His interest in 
all our interests, let us come to our places and bless His name. 

And, coming, let us come with each other, heart to heart, 
joying in our fellowship in Him, longing for the induction into 
this fellowship of every member of our race, and seeking thus the 
universal brotherhood of man. 

And, the breaking of bread together being everywhere a 
mark and pledge of amity with those with whom the bread is 
broken, let us see to it that we are never hence at outs with the 
Founder of the Feast, or with our fellow-guests. 

And, not knowing from one day to another when the bells 
shall ring us in to the eternal banquet-hall of our Prince and 
Saviour, let us seek to be ever ready, with no raiment to look up 
and with no work undone, for the hail of our Redeemer to the 
table of our Heavenly home. 



151 



XVII. 



"Alleluia."— Revelation, 19 :3. 

A word is not the little thing we sometimes think. It is more 
than merely an atmospherical vibration born of the action of the 
hnman voice. It is more than the small coin of conversation be- 
tween man and man. Now it is concentrated history, embalming 
the achievements of one age for the ages to come ; and now it is 
concentrated poetry, fossilizing the events and imaginations of one 
generation for the generations that follow after ; and now it is con- 
centrated testimony, rehearsing the experiences and teachings of 
one period for the inspiration and reliance of the periods that sub- 
sequently occupy the stage of time. 

Alleluia, the word now claiming our devout study, is one of 
these full, rich words. It is a word common to both the Church 
militant and the Church triumphant. It condenses into itself the 
import and inspiration and wealth of many words. It is the Greek 
expression of a Hebrew term ; and its significance will be most 
readily apprehended by an analysis of the original expression. 
Following it thus back to the fountain, and taking the compound 
to pieces, we find that the older form, Hallelujah, is made up of 
the two words, Hallel and Jah : — Hallel meaning, break forth into 
song, or give praise, or offer thanksgiving ; and Jah being the 
name by which the Lord of all was declared unto His ancient 
Church, and being esteemed by that Church as too sacred for 
utterance by mortal lips, meaning independent, perpetual and un- 
originated existence. Combined into one word, Hallel and Jah are 
Hallelujah, and mean, Adore ye Jehovah — ascribe ye all excellence 
to Him Who is for ever and ever, and Whose kingdom ruleth over 
all — give ye glory to the Lord most high ! 

Taking these hallowed syllables appreciatively and worthily 
upon our lips, we affirm our belief in the being and perfections 
and rights of Jehovah. A moment endeavor to imagine your- 
selves adoring chance, or doing homage to evolution, or glorify - 

152 



ing fate, or singing hymns to a myth, or shouting hosannas to 
protoplasm. It is impossible to you, even as an imagination. In- 
telligent devotion can only bend in honor to intelligent and meri- 
torious supremacy. Mind can only render reverence to mind. 
Therefore, crying Alleluia, we affirm our belief in the existence 
and nature and rulership of God as revealed in His holy word ; 
we affirm our belief in Him as existing as actively and really as 
ourselves ; we affirm our belief in Him affirmatively, in antagon- 
ism to Atheism, and exclusively, in antagonism to Polytheism ; 
and we affirm our belief that He is, in all the past and all the pres- 
ent and all the future, Divinely distinct from all other essences, 
the Source and Support of all other essences, and the sum of all 
possible goodness and power and wisdom. 

We announce our conviction of His indefeasible and universal 
lordship. Creatures are sometimes called lords by their fellow- 
men — the term designating a certain condition or estate or office ; 
but every such lordship is always of limited character and dura- 
tion, and is at best partial and superficial. Crying Alleluia, we 
acknowledge God as King of kings and Lord of lords. We admit 
that there is no atom of matter which He does not control, and no 
class of spirit which He does not direct, and no day of time which 
He does not fix, and no evolution of eternity which He does not 
ordain, and no realm of space which He does not pervade. 

Creation gives Him glory ; for He spake, and it was done. 
By Him were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are 
in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones or domin- 
ions or principalities or powers : all things were created by Him 
and for Him ; and He is before all things, and by Him all things 
consist. 

Preservation lays its homage at His feet. He upholdeth all 
things by the word of His power. In Him we live and move and 
have our being. Our breath is in His hands, and His are all our 
ways. 

Redemption pays Him tribute. He remembered us in our 
low estate. He pitied us in the clutch of sin. He sympathized 

153 



with us in our infirmity. He sent us rescue in ' ' One mighty to 
save." He welcomes us to loyalty, and to all its immunities and 
rewards. Ye know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that 
though He was rich, yet for your sakes He became poor, that ye 
through His poverty might be rich. 

We declare our faith that, without exception, He doeth all 
things well. All His dispensations and movements we may not 
comprehend. Indeed, He may ordain or permit much for which 
we can discover no adequate cause. Many of the processes by 
which He effects His designs, and reaches His ends, may lie far 
beyond our ken ; and many of His methods and requirements may 
cross our desires and oppose our will ; and now and then they may 
stagger our faith and tear our hearts. The Lord of all, He often 
moves in a mysterious way : clouds and darkness are around about 
Him : His footsteps are in the deep waters, below our reach, and 
beyond our sight. But He has won the right to be trusted. A 
thousand experiences of His loving-kindness and sufficiency have 
proven to us that He is too good to be unkind, too strong to be 
overcome, and too wise to err. We know Whom we have believed, 
and are persuaded that He is able to keep that which we have 
committed to Him against that day. Crying Aixeluia, there- 
fore, we endorse the love and purity and wisdom of the adminis- 
tration of Jehovah — conceding that He doeth all things well. 

We concede that He doeth all things intelligently : for He is 
a God of knowledge. He that formed the eye, shall He not see ? 
He that planted the ear, shall He not hear ? He that teacheth 
man knowledge, shall He not know ? O, the depth of the riches 
both of the wisdom and knowledge of God : how unsearchable are 
His judgments, and His ways past finding out ! 

We concede that He doeth all things justly : for justice and 
judgment are the habitation of His throne. He dwells in the 
high and holy place. His name is Holy. His ways are equal : 
there is no iniquity in Him. Shall not the Judge of all the earth 
do right ? 

And we concede that He doeth all things lovingly : for His 

154 



mercies are over all His works. He is no hard Master. He com- 
missions none on bootless errands, and subjects none to needless 
hardships. Like as a father pitieth his children, so the Lord 
pitieth them that fear Him. They that sow in tears shall reap in 
joy. Poor and needy, still the Lord thinketh upon us. 

We express our sense of His right to praise, and of our obli- 
gation to show forth His praise. Acknowledging that He is God, 
and that His kingdom ruleth over all, and that all His dispensa- 
tions and movements glow with intelligence and justice and love, 
and that all His operations propose our well-being — whether we 
study His works of creation or grace or providence : surely, be- 
yond either discussion or doubt, He deserves our praise, and we 
owe Him its tribute. Admitting, with Juvenal, that ingratitude 
is the essence and sum of all crimes, and that human-kindness 
earns becoming return, and that our fellows who befriend us 
should sit in the high places of our hearts and wake our lips to 
song : surely the Fount of every blessing has claims paramount to 
all other claims ; and worthy words ought to leap to carry the 
freight of grateful souls ; and worthy works ought to show what 
our souls would say if their capacity were equal to their sense of 
delight and obligation. Crying Alleluia, therefore, we are all 
aflame with grateful impulse to Jehovah. We confess His desert 
of every service we can pay ; feel that 

•' Had we ten thousand thousand tongues, 
Not one should silent be : 
Had we ten thousand thousand hearts, 
We'd give them all to Thee " ; 

and so we lie entranced with the far-off acclaim of the Church of 
the Upper Temple, as we catch its blessed hosanna from over the 
intervening sea : " Amen : Blessing, and glory, and wisdom, and 
thanksgiving, and honor, and power, and might, be unto God, 
for ever and ever. Amen. ' ' 

We proclaim our hearty wish for a part with those who make 
melody unto the Lord. Conceding the character and right and 
sovereignty of God, and feeling our relations to Him, and hearing 

155 



the waves of worship which surge about His throne, we can not 
hold our peace. All else doing Him honor, we can not keep si- 
lence. All else proclaiming His praise, we can not remain dumb. As 

" Before Jehovah's awful throne 
All nations bow with sacred joy " , 

and the entire universe, animate and inanimate, is vocal with 
doxologies, our hearts burn within us and our lips fly open to let 
forth the hallowed flame. Constraint — the constraint of appre- 
ciating, grateful love is on us; and, noting how His benedictions 
cover our heads and crowd our paths, and how His mercies 
brighten our days and cheer our nights, and how His eyes run to 
and fro throughout the whole earth to show Him strong in our 
behalf, we can not help the expression of thanksgiving ; and we 
shout to all who would restrain us, "How can we keep from 
singing? " Crying Alleluia, therefore, we ask admission to the 
choir of Creation ; we declare our desire to laud and magnify the 
name of Jehovah ; and we summons the multitude of singers to 
open their ranks and let us swell their song. 

We find ourselves amid goodly company, and impelled by 
high authority and illustrious example. 

We are impelled by the call of Divine oracles. L,et the peo- 
ple praise Thee, O God : let all the people praise Thee. Make a 
joyful noise unto God, all ye lands. Rejoice in the Lord always ; 
and again I say, rejoice. 

We are impelled by the cry of our own hearts ; for praise is 
an instinct of every soul of genuine nobility. Favors compel it 
to grateful response. It can not receive without thankful recogni- 
tion. It can not help giving its emotion utterance. Taking from 
man, it must say, Thank you. Taking from God, it must say, 
Bless the Lord, O my soul ; and it must shout Alleluia ! Si- 
lence would kill it. 

We are impelled by the custom of the saints. Coming safely 
from the passage of the Red Sea, Moses sings, ' ' Who is like unto 
Thee, O Lord, among the gods? Who is like Thee, glorious in 
holiness, fearful in praises, doing wonders ! ' ' Coming triumph- 

156 



antly from her heroic campaign against the Canaanites, Deborah 
sings, "So let all Thine enemies perish, O Lord; but let them 
that love Thee be as the sun, when he goeth forth in his might !' ' 
Exulting in his fore-glimpse of the Messianic reign, David sings, 
1 ' Blessed be His glorious name for ever ; and let the whole earth 
be filled with His glory ! ' ' Fondling the Babe of Bethlehem in 
his arms, Simeon sings, "Lord, now lettest Thou Thy servant 
depart in peace ; for mine eyes have seen Thy salvation!" Hail- 
ing the defeat of death, and the transformation of the grave into a 
waiting-room for the celestial bridal,, Paul sings, ' ' Thanks be unto 
God, Who giveth us the victory, through our Lord Jesus Christ!" 
Jubilant with the outcome of the Atonement, Peter sings, "Blessed 
be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ : Who, accord- 
ing to His abundant mercy, hath begotten us again unto a lively 
hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an 
inheritance incorruptible and undefiled and that fadeth not away!" 
Overwhelmed with his vision of the goodness laid up for those 
who trust in God before the sons of men, Jude sings, " To the 
only wise God, our Saviour, be glory and majesty and dominion 
and power, both now and ever, Amen ! " 

We are impelled by the example of the Son of Man. Closing 
the Feast of the Passover, the Jewish Church always sang the 
one hundredth and thirteenth and the one hundred and eighteenth 
Psalms, inclusively, and styled these Psalms "The Hallel. " So, 
having partaken of the Paschal Supper, Jesus and His disciples, 
in the use of these sacred songs, sang, ' ' Blessed be the Name of 
the Lord from this time forth, and for evermore. Not unto us, O 
Lord, not unto us, but unto Thy name give glory, for Thy mercy, 
and for Thy truth's sake. O, give thanks unto the Lord ; for He 
is good: for His mercy endureth for ever." And thus, through 
all His life among the children of men, He sets His Father before 
Him : in boyhood always being about His Father's business ; in 
the wilderness chasing the tempter with His challenge to worship 
God ; in Gethsemane drinking the cup of unutterable bitterness, 
saying, ' ' Father, Thy will be done " ; in His intercessory prayer, 

157 



imploring, ' ' Father, glorify Thy Son, that Thy Son may also 
glorify Thee * ' ; and in the misery of the cross crying, ' ' Father, 
into Thine hands I commit My spirit." 

And we are impelled by the fashion of the skies. As the 
earthly temple takes on the similitude of the heavenly, Isaiah sees 
the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up ; and His train 
fills the sanctuary; and winged seraphim, with veiled faces and cov- 
ered feet, hover about Him in willing waiting ; and the door-posts 
tremble with the volume of their chant, " Holy, holy, holy, is the 
Lord of hosts : the whole earth is full of His glory. ' ' Caring for 
their flocks on the heights of Bethlehem, early one morning, some 
shepherds find themselves begirt with the glory of God, hail the 
birthday of the Prince of Peace, and hear an angelic assemblage 
carol, " Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good- 
will toward men." Engaged one Sabbath in the worship of Him 
for love of Whom he is an exile and prisoner, the banished John 
beholds desolate Patmos fragrant and luminous with celestial min- 
istries, and overhears the refrain of the ransomed before the throne : 
' ' Worthy is the Lamb that was slain to receive power and riches 
and wisdom and strength and honor and glory and blessing. 
Blessing and honor and glory and power be unto Him that sitteth 
upon the throne, and unto the Lamb for ever and ever." 

" The glorious armies of the sky 

To Thee, Almighty King, 
Triumphant anthems consecrate, 

And Hallelujahs sing." 

We note that men even in the presence of worldly joys shout 
their glee ; and if they for earthly pleasures, shall not we for 
heavenly ? After forty days of confinement on the vessel bearing 
them thither, a companion of Bishop Gilbert Haven discerns the 
shore of Africa in the distance, and breaks forth into hearty Halle- 
lujahs. At last the long contest of the Republican Convention for 
the nomination of a candidate for the Presidency in Eighteen 
hundred and sixty, ends in the choice of Abraham Lincoln ; and 
lusty ejaculations of "Glory to God!" and "Hallelujah!" 

158 



shake the immense wigwam. By telegraph, one dark, stormy 
night, Pittsburgh and vicinity heard of Lee's surrender ; and 
hells pealed out their loudest notes ; men, women and children 
thronged the streets ; " Bless the Lord "s, " Glory to God ' 's, and 
41 Hallelujah "s, enough to overstock a thousand camp-meetings, 
were heard everywhere ; and finally the multitudes under the lead 
of Dr. Howard waked the welkin with the Doxology. Fire, a 
few years ago, ravaged a rural settlement of the Northwest, and 
particularly endangered a little hamlet where two mills furnished 
labor and sustenance to the community. All toiled to the utmost 
to arrest the burning torrent, but in vain, and they gave up the 
struggle in despair and exhaustion. Briefly afterward, apparently 
from a cloudless sky, the rain fell heavily, the winds veered the 
other way, and the flames were stayed. Immediately one of the 
owners of the mills and settlement, no professor of religion, cast 
himself on the ground on his knees, his face in the dust ; and 
after a short silence, leaped to his feet shouting, " Men, hurrah for 
God! He did it. Hurrah for God!" Many of you remember 
the " Black Friday" which swooped down upon the nation some 
years since. With many its very memory is a nightmare today. 
A friend who was present told me that the Chicago Merchants' 
Exchange was filled with men mad with fear and mourning, while 
in front of the building surged a hopeless multitude. A telegram 
came from New York, draping the darkness with a darker hue ; 
and strong men groaned and wept in the full conviction that their 
fortunes were fled, and their families breadless and homeless. 
Soon another telegram was read, saying, " Confidence is return- 
ing; the worst is over ;" and Hallelujahs shook that temple of 
Mammon. And the President of the Exchange rushed to the door, 
read the telegram to the crowd, and said, "It's God Who has 
saved us : no one else could do it ;" and then he led the thronging 
masses in singing the Doxology, lifted up his hands, and pro- 
nounced the benediction. 

O, ye careless, godless men and women, it is not for you to 
rebuke or ridicule the glad and loud acclaim of the men and 

159 



women whose feet feel beneath them the - ' Rock of Ages. ' ' Even 
over the paltriest gains and honors of earth, you are rocked with 
excitement and utter most extravagant exclamations ; and often 
emergencies constrain you, in spite of your assumed self-poise, to 
lay your adoration on the altar of the God you ordinarily disre- 
gard and ignore. 

O, ye men and women, who are the children of the King, 
and heirs of immortal riches ; be not frozen into ungrateful quiet 
by the fear or frown of men and women who are by no means your 
equals in intellectual culture and excellence, and who are so sig- 
nally your inferiors in moral worth and in the riches and style of 
the "Kingdom of Heaven." "Let the redeemed of the Lord 
say so. " 

" Come, ye that love the Lord, 

And let your joys be known : 
Join in a song of sweet accord, 

While ye surround His throne. 
Let those refuse to sing 

Who never knew our God ; 
But servants of the Heavenly King 

May speak their joys abroad." 

Alleluia ! Ejaculation charged with such fragrant and hal- 
lowed import ! How pitiful and shameful and sinful that its 
language is such an alien to our lips, and its sentiment such a for- 
eigner to our souls. O, that nevermore it may be such a stranger 
to either our lips or our souls. 

Alleluia ! Even from this hour forward, may it be our con- 
stant experience and frequent expression, in the private place, and 
in the public walk — felt and spoken to the comfort and edification 
of ourselves, and to the ecstasy and growth of our fellow- saints, 
and to the impression and renewal of those about us who are with- 
out the adoption and heirship of sons, and to the praise of the 
grace of God over all, blessed for evermore : our shield and our 
exceeding great reward. 

Alleluia ! Let it be spoken when the night is the blackness 
of darkness, and when the stars lend their lamps, and when the 
sun is in the sky — along all the path of our pilgrimage, amid the 

160 



shadows which attend its close, as death conducts us into the 
house appointed for all the living, and as seraphic wardens fling 
open the everlasting gates, and the radiance of the celestial city- 
hails us home to our " Father's House." 

Alleluia ! Let it be spoken as angels bear us to our ap- 
pointed mansions, and Christ greets us with His congratulation, 
and friends, lost awhile, rush into our arms to be ours for ever. 

Alleluia ! Let it be spoken long as we are members of the 
Church of Probation, in the presence of every fresh bliss, and of 
every fresh deliverance, and of every fresh gain, and of every fresh 
growth, and of every fresh victory ; and when we give in our cer- 
tificates to the Church of Recompense, in the presence of every new 
beauty, and of every new development, and of every new rapture, 
while eternal years go gliding by ; and for ever and ever, and for 
ever and ever, and for ever and ever. 

" O, join ye the anthems of triumph that rise 
From the throng of the blest, from the hosts of the skies : 

Alleluia ! they sing in rapturous strains ; 
Alleluia ! the Lord God Omnipotent reigns." 



161 



XVIII. 

11 And they shall hang upon him all the glory of his father's house." — 
Isaiah, 22: 24. 

Hezekiah is on the throne of Judah, and Shebna is the super- 
ior officer of his court. Shebna is evidently not above suspicion 
as to his integrity. He is not so much like Aristides as to be in 
danger of ostracism because everybody is commending his recti- 
tude. The truth is, he is an unprincipled politician, occupying 
his place for the advantage of himself rather than for the advan- 
tage of his country. Isaiah declares his disposition and disgrace, 
though he has come to regard himself as a nail fastened in a sure 
place — a boss beyond dislocation — and declares the elevation of 
Kliakim in his stead. 

The prophet also foretells the fortune of Eliakim. He shall 
be fastened "asa nail in a sure place." Among us nails, or pegs, 
serve as supports for clothes, ornaments, pictures and various 
utensils. They are often more serviceable than sightly. The 
same custom obtained in ancient days. And it was likewise the 
custom to line the walls of temples with such projections, and on 
them to suspend, for display and preservation, trophies won in 
victorious warfare. What Shebna, without warrant, imagined 
himself to be, Eliakim shall be in fact : a nail fastened in a sure 
place — a place from which he will not be easily pulled out, but a 
place where he will hold. 

He shall be for a glorious throne to his father's house. He 
shall carry no base or common burden. He shall fill his office 
illustriously. The dignity and peace and wealth of the country 
will be safe in his hands. His administration will sun in its- 
patronage neither jobs nor scandals nor stealings. 

And on him shall hang all the glory of his father's house. 
No eclipse will enwrap its honor because of his prominence. It 
may have been a lowly house ; but it shall gather distinction from 
his distinction. It shall be glorified in his glory. It shall shine- 
in his radiance. 

162 



There is here a fore- shadowing of the relationship of Jesus 
Christ to the Christian Church. "Ye are God's building." 
" Know ye not that ye are the temple of God? " " Now there- 
fore, ye are no more strangers and foreigners, but fellow-citizens 
with the saints, and of the household of God : and are built upon 
the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ Himself 
being the chief corner stone ; in Whom all the building fitly 
framed together, groweth unto an holy temple in the Lord : in 
Whom also ye are builded together for an habitation of God 
through the Spirit. '' 

Yes, bear in mind that Jesus Christ is the chief corner stone 
of this building. ' ' For other foundation can no man lay than 
that is laid, which is Jesus Christ." " For through Him we all 
have access by one Spirit unto the Father. ' ' 

And on Him hangs all the glory of this building, His Father's 
house. It once had no existence : ' ' Which in time past were not 
a people, but are now the people of God." Many a flood has 
surged around it, and many a storm has beaten upon it ; but "the 
Lord of hosts is with us : the God of Jacob is our refuge. ' ' It 
has outlived the tempest which has strewn the waters of time with 
the wrecks of so many navies. It has maintained its erectness 
amid the downfall of so many imposing establishments. Beneath 
its ministries multiplied millions have been lifted from the mire 
and the clay, and have been stationed upon the Rock of Ages ; 
and from its towers multitudes which no man can number have 
plumed themselves for their passage to beatific scenes. But on 
the Lord Jesus Christ hangs all the glory of His Father's house. 
1 ' Neither is there salvation in any other : for there is none other 
name under Heaven given among men, whereby we must be 
saved." "Wherefore God also hath highly exalted Him, and 
given Him a name which is above every name : that at the name 
of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in Heaven, and things 
in earth, and things under the earth ; and that every tongue should 
confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father." 

And there is here an illustration of man's relationship to 

163 



man. " None of us liveth to himself." We do not stand alone 
We stand in rows. Consciously or unconsciously, for weal or for 
woe, we all affect each other. 

We affect each other as to our character : that is, we, to some 
extent, determine what each other is ; and what a man is, is his 
character. 

We affect each other as to our reputation : that is, we, to 
some extent, determine the common estimate of each other ; and 
the common estimate of a man is his reputation. 

We affect each other in the ratio of our personal force and 
position. If we dwell on the mountain of our relationship, we 
are apparent and influential in proportion to our elevation. If 
our home is in the valley, of course we will not be felt or seen so 
far. But whether our sphere is large or small, on us, in some 
measure, hangs its glory. Our ascent is its ascent. Our praise 
is its praise. ''Whether one member suffer, all the members 
suffer with it ; orone member be honored, all the members rejoice 
with it." 

A good creed is admirable. It may be a marvellous combi- 
nation of logic and rhetoric and truth. There may be in it a 
potency to redeem a nation or to save a world. But it drops no 
benedictions, and wins no victories, until it is announced and lived 
and pushed. Ideas are forceless unless they are illustrated. 
Sentiments are powerless until they are put into conduct. Faith 
without works is dead. The men who bear the glory of their 
father's house are men who believe, and therefore speak. That is 
why the name of Paul is a bugle-note today. That is why you 
can hardly hear the name of Luther without wanting to fight some 
hoary old sin. That is why, though his " body lies mouldering in 
the grave," John Brown's " soul is marching on." You need 
some one in every community, who knows the right, to stand up 
for it in deed and in utterance ; to stand up for it, though he stand 
alone ; to stand up for it until he shall stand amid thronging gar- 
lands of vsuccess ; to stand up for it until a regenerated commun- 
ity shall hang upon him all the glory of its regeneration. You 

164 



need men who dare to be conservative when the masses are rush- 
ing foolishly forward, and progressive when the masses are as 
foolishly pulling backward ; men who now act as breakwaters 
against raging floods, and now as pioneers through pathless forests; 
men who now go out in front with sling and stones to smite giant 
errors in the forehead, and now infuse courage and might into the 
listless and timid who are waiting to see if any of the rulers have 
believed ; men who now lead on to new and sublime accomplish- 
ments, and now maintain the victories already won. 

You want them in business — men who abhor dishonesty in 
all forms, despise the gain of oppression, and scorn all tricks of 
trade ; men who, in selling, will not ask more than the worth of 
the article on sale, and who, in buying, will not seek for less ; men 
who, entering into a contract, will observe it to the letter ; men 
who, covenanting to their own hurt, will change not, even though 
adherence to their covenant hurt them ever so much. 

You want them in politics — men who will not barter their 
manhood for the obtainment of office ; men who, obtaining office, 
will capably, honestly and punctually fulfill its obligations ; men 
who will shake their hands from the holding of bribes ; men who 
would not steal from the commonwealth any sooner than from 
their neighbor ; men who would rather be right than be President ; 
men who, being clean and pure themselves, will administer and 
legislate in the interest of the clean and pure, no matter which 
way their party may go, and no matter how gamblers and rascals 
may vote. 

You want them in society — men and women of enlightened, 
and regnant conscience, of high principle, and of rugged virtue ; 
who will ban the adulterer as well as the adulteress ; who are 
neither drunkards nor drunkard-makers ; who will insist that, to 
be fashionable, people must be moral and sensible ; in whose eyes 
a vile person is contemned; who are brave enough to be singular, 
no matter how Mrs. Grundy may laugh or look or swear. 

You want them in the Church — men and women who, with 
all they have of beauty and character and intelligence and piety 

165 



and station and wealth, will walk before God in all His ordinances, 
blameless ; who will avoid all appearance of evil ; who will con- 
tend for the faith once delivered to the saints in all the power and 
purity and simplicity of its announcement, and in all the beauty 
and force and righteousness of its practice ; who will be in daily 
experience of the peace which passeth all understanding ; who will 
every hour grow in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord 
Jesus Christ ; who will neither abandon nor lightly esteem the 
ordinances ; who will neither break nor crack the Sabbath by 
needless journeys or visits or works ; who will never, by example 
any more than by teaching, cause the way of truth to be evil 
spoken of; who will always be in the field, and never in the 
hospital ; who will be an inspiration and a help to those of in- 
ferior age and advancement and opportunity ; who will be a con- 
stant and mighty protest against the indifference and negligence 
and unfaithfulness of those who have a name to live but are really 
dead in trespass and in sin ; who will, with clear voice, firm hand 
and steady foot, awe the cowardly and indolent and treacherous, 
and pour tonic into the souls of the despairing and weak ; who 
will be a fortress of retreat when the armies of aliens are in ap- 
parent supremacy, and a tower of strength when the legions of 
the Lord are driving the enemies to the wall ; who will be men 
and women of God, full of faith and of the Holy Ghost ; wise unto 
that which is good, and simple unto that which is evil ; humble, 
but mighty ; lowly, but prominent ; children, but giants ; fond of 
peace, but willing for war ; each only one, but one who can chase 
a thousand. 

You want them in the family — fathers, mothers and children, 
on each of whom shall hang the glory of the house ; who shall 
touch and thrill each other into loftiest styles of living ; who, by 
the generous nobility and unselfish refinement of their conduct, in 
all their ways, shall be dissuasives from all that is boorish and pro- 
fane and vulgar, and impulses to all that is gentle and pure and 
sweet ; who, by the informing and uplifting tone of their conver- 
sation, shall lift the household above gossip and scandal and twad- 

166 



die, and imbue it with a knowledge of God and men and nature 
and things ; who, by their correct convictions and habits, shall 
develop in one another proper opinions and practices as to amuse- 
ments and morals and religion ; who will be so builded into one 
another in all which is good and loving and rich and sublime and 
wise, that none, when dying, will have doubtfully to ask, ' 4 Will 
they miss me at home ? ' ' 

In some connection, and in some measure, glory is possible to 
every individual who dares to do a generous and holy deed in the 
face of general apathy and cowardice and indolence. It is a glory 
which comes of bravery, conscience, goodness, intelligence and 
truth. It is the glory which was won by Enoch in his company 
with God in the midst of his godless generation. It is the glory 
which was won by David in his self-denial, when refusing the 
waters of the well of Bethlehem, lest the satisfaction of his thirst 
should increase the thirst of his stricken soldiers. It is the glory 
which was won by Wilbur Fisk. He was chaplain of a military 
company, and was present at one of its suppers. According to 
the usual custom, a bottle of brandy was at each plate; but not a 
cork was drawn during the meal. When the company rose from 
the table, Fisk said to the commanding officer, "Captain, your guns 
are well loaded, but not a shot has been fired." And the captain 
replied, ' ' Yes ; and it is all out of respect to you. It is a pleasure, 
upon such occasions, to defer to your sentiments." O that our 
Christianity were so Christian that our very presence would send 
sin skulking into a corner ! 

Nor is this glory a mere appurtenance of the individual. Its 
rays stream out and bathe in their lustre the family of the individ- 
ual. The glory of Samuel encircled Hannah. The glory of 
Garfield enveloped her whose maternal care trained him into his 
brilliant manhood. The glory of Christ was reflected on His vir- 
gin mother. 

What a motive this is to honorable and upright life ! Who 
does not feel its power? Surely, he who has an iota of sensibility 
will not bring discredit to his family. Surely, even though con- 

167 



senting to infamy for himself, he will halt and turn as he realizes 
that the infamy will be not merely his personal inheritance, but 
also the inheritance of the mother who bore him, and of the wife 
who has forsaken all others in order to follow his fortune, and of 
the child who wears his name without any election of his own. 
Surely, he who is, at fearful odds, fighting for the right, will fight 
more earnestly than ever as he remembers that his triumph is the 
triumph of those who are dearer to him than he is to himself. 

Let no one carry off all the honor of the connection. Let 
no one lightly consent to merely sun himself in the radiance of 
the family. Let no one be a curse or shadow or weight on the 
home to which he belongs, because of his unworthy or worthless 
deportment in any of the relations of life. 

Let every one be ambitious to be and do his best in every cir- 
cle in which he revolves, whether in business, or in politics, or in 
society, or in the Church. Let every one of you be thus ambi- 
tious for your own sake, and for the sake of those who are bone of 
your bone, and flesh of your flesh. Their only hope of distinc- 
tion may be in you. On you may hang all the glory of the house. 
Boys and girls, remember the old folks at home. Husbands and 
wives, remember that you are one. Parents, remember your 
children. And may the remembrance be an anchor in every 
storm, and a shield in every temptation ! 

O, the power and scope of personality ! Travellers report in 
South America a species of palm which attracts the atmospheric 
moisture, condenses it into dew, and drops it refreshingly upon 
the thirsty earth . It looms up in the midst of a burning desert, 
and forthwith the desert blooms into luxuriant vegetation. The 
clouds may be empty, the fountains cease to flow, and the rivers 
almost vanish from their beds ; but all the busier is the benevolent 
tree in compelling the atmosphere to give forth moisture, and in 
planting an oasis where the parched and toil-worn pilgrim can 
pause for drink and food and shade. So can one humble human 
being go out into the wilderness of life, and be a pillar of cloud by 
day and a pillar of fire by night ; go out and be a shadow of a 

168 



great rock in a weary land ; go out and be a tree planted by rivers 
of water, that bringeth forth his fruit in his season, and whose fruit 
shall be for the healing of the nations. 

And O, how the glory of the person is the glory of his house ! 
Assembling his army beneath the Pyramids, and proposing its 
stimulation to unwonted valor, Napoleon shouted, " Forty cen- 
turies are looking down upon you !" O, my hearers, your ancestry 
has you in its eye ; your posterity is looking toward you ; your 
darlings at home are watching you. ■* Wherefore, seeing we also 
are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay 
aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and 
let us run with patience the race that is set before us, looking unto 
Jesus the Author and Finisher of our faith ; Who for the joy that 
was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is 
set down at the right hand of the throne of God." O, men, 
women, and children, if on us hangs all the glory of our father's 
house, let it hang on a nail fastened in a sure place — let it hang 
where it will never fall ! 



169 



XIX. 

" If we let Him thus alone, all men will believe on Him."— John, 11 :48. 

Jesus of Bethlehem is busily prosecuting His mission of mercy 
among the children of men. Words such as man never spake are 
falling from His lips. Works such as man never wrought are 
wrought at His mandate — even death letting go its clutch, and 
the grave surrendering its tenantry, at His summons. 

Just now, His recent resurrection of Lazarus from the slum- 
ber of the tomb has lifted Him into still greater prominence in the 
eyes of the people. In large masses they are falling into line, and 
rapidly growing into readiness to follow wherever His standard 
shall lead the way. 

The Pharisees and priests give evidence of increasing alarm 
at these popular demonstrations in His favor, hasten into consul- 
tation, recognize the gravity of the situation, and resolve on earn- 
est and immediate measures to arrest His triumphal march — 
saying, " If we let Him thus alone, all men will believe on Him." 

And He does attractively and forcibly and inherently com- 
mend Himself to humanity wherever it has knowledge of Him. 
This is the admission of the arrant antagonism which assailed 
Him in the days of His incarnation. The truth filters through 
unfriendly lips. Even His enemies become unconscious and un- 
willing confessors of His Divine character ; concede that he doeth 
many miracles ; and proclaim that, with a fair chance, He will 
win universal faith. 

This is the confession of the bitterest prejudice. A ruler of 
the Jews, Nicodemus, comes stealthily into His company, and de- 
clares, " We know that Thou art a Teacher come from God ; for no 
man can do these miracles that Thou doest, except God be with 
him." An honorable counsellor, Joseph of Arimathea, " w T hich 
also waited for the kingdom of God, came, and went in boldly 
unto Pilate, and craved the body of Jesus." And Saul of Tarsus, 
a most devoted adherent of the Mosaic economy, and a most 
malignant hater of the Messianic economy, kneels at the feet of 

170 



the despised Galilean, and shouts, " This is a faithful saying, and 
worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world 
to save sinners. ' ' 

This is the expression of the most capable criticism. Dr. 
Channing says, ' ' The character of Jesus is wholly inexplicable on 
human principles. " Carlyle says, ' ■ Jesus of Nazareth, our Divin- 
est symbol! Higher has the human thought not yet reached." 
Herder says, "Jesus Christ is, in the noblest and most perfect 
sense, the realized ideal of humanity." Napoleon says, " Jesus 
Christ was more than man : He founded His empire on love, and 
to this very day millions would die for Him." Rousseau says, 
* ' The facts about Socrates, which no one doubts, are not so well 
attested as those about Jesus Christ. If the death of Socrates be 
that of a sage, the life and death of Jesus Christ are those of a 
God." Spinoza says, "He is the symbol of Divine wisdom." 
Kant says, *' He is the symbol of ideal perfection." Hegel says, 
"He is the symbol of the Divine and human." Goethe says, 
u The sublimity proceeding from His person is of so Divine a kind 
as only the Divine could ever have manifested upon earth." 
Richter says, " He, being the holiest among the mighty, and the 
mightiest among the holy, lifted with His pierced hand empires off 
their hinges, and turned the stream of centuries out of its chan- 
nel, and still governs the ages." 

This is the testimony of the most enlightened experience. 
Bunsen says, " My highest honor, and my largest joy, is in hav- 
ing known Jesus Christ. ' ' De Wette says, * ' This only I know, 
that there is salvation in no other name than in the name of Jesus 
Christ, the crucified, and that nothing loftier offers itself to hu- 
manity than the God-manhood realized in Him, and the kingdom 
which He founded. " Bishop Gilbert Haven says, ' ' He is a whole 
Christ, a full Saviour : Glory be to God for such a salvation ! " 
Sir James Mcintosh says, ' ' Jesus : Love ; Jesus : Love — the same 
thing!" Polycarp says, "Eighty and six years have I served 
Him, and He never did me wrong ; and how can I now blaspheme 
my King Who has saved me ? " 

171 



This is the voice of Jesus Himself. ' ' He that believeth on 
the Son of God hath the witness in himself." "I, if I be lifted 
tip from the earth, will draw all men unto Me." " Verily, verily, 
I say unto you, the hour is coming, and now is, when the dead 
shall hear the voice of the Son of God, and they that hear shall 
live." 

Any limited acceptance of Him among the children of men is 
because of inadequate knowledge of Him, through opposing 
forces and influences. Among these forces and influences may be 
named the world, the flesh, the devil, the misinterpretation of 
science, the teachings of skepticism, and the want of Christlike 
Christianity in the Church. 

And the deliverance of humanity from these alien domina- 
tions, and the fixing of its eye directly upon the Son of Man as 
He is set forth in His Gospel, will soon lead it everywhere to pro- 
claim, " Now, we believe : for we have heard Him ourselves, and 
know that this is indeed the Christ, the Saviour of the world." 

Drop a curtain about the allurements of the world, and hush 
its syren voice ; and what crowding columns will close in around 
Immanuel and crown Him Lord of all ! 

Fetter the flesh, and force it down into its due and subordi- 
nate place as the simple handmaid of the soul ; and what immense 
hosts of the most abject of all slaves will escape their bonds, and 
find the freedom of those whom the truth makes free ! 

Force the devil back into the dungeon digged for his imprison- 
ment in those remote ages when he fell like lightning from the 
skies ; and what large masses will ground their arms, hurry into 
the camp of the Captain of our salvation, and gladly take the oath 
of allegiance ! 

Remand science to her own legitimate domain, seating her at 
the feet of the Maker and Monarch of all things, and setting her 
to the interpretation of His works ; and what matchless multi- 
tudes, clothed, and in their right mind, will see through nature up 
to nature's God ! 

Shear skepticism of its vanity and vice, (for it is mainly 

172 



vanity and vice,) and show it in its real character — a bundle of 
negations and pretences ; and what mighty myriads, rescued from 
their shadow and shame, will press their exultant way into the 
sunlight and triumph of Faith ! 

Transform the Church into a copy of the Church portrayed 
in the Gospel of its Founder, every member a miniature of Christ, 
and every society of members a household of Christ ; and what 
trooping throngs, cleansed from all uncleanness, and walking 
worthy of Him Who hath called them into His glory and king- 
dom, will return and come to Zion with songs, and everlasting joy 
upon their heads ! 

You must in some way becloud and hamper the Son of Man ; 
or His inherent, manifest excellence will irresistibly stream forth, 
and win the homage of every other man. You can not leave Him 
and another man alone, without that other man growing into one 
with the Son of Man. Compel antagonisms and obscurities to 
hide their hideous heads, drive counterfeits and misinterpretations 
into the dust, and hold up Christ as He stands in the Scriptures 
of His own inspiration ; and all men will believe on Him. 

Believed on by all men, what evil will be done? Who will 
have damage by the universal faith ? Even the world will be none 
the worse ; for it will gleam in its old beauty, and laugh in its old 
bliss. Nor the flesh ; for it will once more have access to the 
Tree of Life. Nor the devil ; for he will only hurry to his chosen 
dominion. Nor science ; for she will inherit the baptism of a 
clearer eye and a sublimer outlook. Nor skepticism ; for it will 
mount from the bogs and swamps of doubt, and scale the summits 
of certainty and peace. Nor the Church ; for she will obtain de- 
liverance from the defilements and disabilities which soil her face 
and tie her limbs, and put on her most beautiful garments, and 
wend her way out of the wilderness, leaning upon the arm of her 
Beloved. 

Family life will be overhung with a cloud and smoke by day, 
and the shining of a flaming fire by night ; and offspring and par- 



173 



ents will lie in the bosom of Him of Whom the family in earth 
and in Heaven is named. 

Individual life will be hid with Christ in God, and man every- 
where will walk the way set before him, transparent, like some 
holy thing. 

National life will beam with the benediction which begets 
men into fellow-citizens with saints — its flag the flag of Calvary, 
its King the King of kings, and its policy the inspiration of the 
skies. 

Social life will glisten with the dew and shine with the glow 
of brotherly-kindness — all men's good each man's rule, and all 
men looking with kindly eyes upon the things of others. 

Universal life will doff the rags of its lapse, don the raiment 
of Paradise, and march for a better heritage than Paradise ever 
knew — occupying a new earth, overarched with new heavens, and 
the one not a child's short step from the other. 

Verily, it will be no dark day in the calendar of Time when 
all men shall believe on the Son of God. It will be a day of sur- 
passing brilliance and transcendent felicity — the very creature de- 
livered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of 
the children of God ; humanity wearing the image of God ; and 
immortality ringing all its bells and sweeping all its harps to the 
praise of God, and singing with all its voices, "Aswe have heard, 
so have we seen in the city of our God. O how great is the goodness 
which Thou hast laid up for them that fear Thee, which Thou 
hast wrought out for them that trust in Thee before the sons of 
men." 

I charge you then, ye armies of the aliens, in the name of the 
Lord of hosts, that ye let Jesus of Bethlehem alone. 

Behold Him closely — analyzing His being and character and 
life and offer and work ; for He craves such inspection : ■ ' Search 
the Scriptures : they are they which testify of Me. ' ' Believe on 
Him fully ; for the things written about Him ' ' are written that ye 
might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God ; and that, 
believing, ye might have life through His name. ' ' Follow Him 

174 



steadily and studiously ; for, if a man keep His sayings, he shall 
never see death. 

But how, then, is He to be let alone? In His doctrine, 
about God and Himself and man. Accept it without dilution and 
without dissent ; for the words which He speaks are spirit, and 
they are life. In His government : ' ' God hath highly exalted 
Him, and given Him a name which is above every name, that at 
the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in Heaven, 
and things in earth, and things under the earth ; and that every 
tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of 
God the Father ; ' ' and none hath hardened himself against Him and 
prospered. In His ways — His ways of conversion and faith and 
holiness and love and obedience : His ways for the life of the 
Church and the community and the individual. ' ' Set your hearts 
unto all the words which I testify among you this day .... For it 
is not a vain thing for you ; because it is your life." " Ye shall 
not add unto the word which I command you, neither shall ye 
diminish ought from it. " Ye must not, even in the fancy that you 
can carry it more handsomely or safely, touch with rude hands 
the ark of the Lord. Ye must let the Lord have His own way. 
Ye must not forget His own reminder, ' ' Not every one that saith 
unto Me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of Heaven ; 
but he that doeth the will of My Father which is in Heaven." 

Carrying, then, either the banner of antagonism, or the flag 
of indifference, or the standard of self-sufficiency, call off your 
hordes ! Whether you are avowed enemies, or inconsistent friends, 
sound the bugle of retreat ! 

Certainly, I would hail your submission to His sovereign 
sceptre. He hath bought you with His own blood. He covets 
your perfect felicity. He plans and pleads for your sympathy for 
yourselves. He will welcome your partnership with Him in great 
and noble enterprises, that you may be sharers with Him in all 
the dignities and riches of the outcome. 

Do, however, as you may, I have no fear of the outcome. 
The decree has gone forth, ' ' He shall be called God of the whole 

17«> 



earth ! " The Almighty Father has ordained His coronation. 
His own right hand will cleave His way to the possession of the 
uttermost parts of the earth. His own supreme and transparent 
excellence will gather all principalities and powers in rapture and 
in reverence to His footstool. 

Enmity may add to the years that shall intervene before the 
millennial glory shall flame along the expanding skies. Incon- 
sistency may increase the burden He has to carry, and lengthen the 
path He has to travel to reach the enthronement when all His 
enemies shall be put under His feet. Nevertheless, victory is 
sure. Neutrality and opposition shall be ground to powder be- 
neath the stone cut out of the mountains without hands, as it 
sweeps its onward way. Resistlessly, steadily, stupendously, our 
God is marching on. 

In the interest of humanity, fallen from its original orbit, and 
shorn of its original possession and prospect , and in the interest 
of yourselves, waging a hopeless and unrighteous warfare, ye foes 
of the Anointed, whether open or secret, lay down your arms. 
" Kiss the Son, lest He be angry, and ye perish from the way, 
when His wrath is kindled but a little." 

Only let Him alone, willing in the day of His power ; and all 
men will believe on Him. As I need not reiterate, I have not a 
word to say in arrest or disparagement of all possible diligence for 
the cultivation of self in Divine things, or for the capture of the 
world for Christ. As earnestly and habitually as ever, ' ' Take 
heed unto thyself, and unto the doctrine ; continue in them : for 
in doing this thou shalt both save thyself, and them that hear 
thee." As earnestly and habitually as ever, on with your exhor- 
tations and missions and prayers and songs and toils. Yea, mul- 
tiply them a thousand fold. But Christ is no pensioner on unre- 
generacy. He is no penniless prince, begging His way back to a 
lost domain. He is not running hither and thither, soliciting 
alms. He must not be regarded as needing either men or means. 
He can raise up agencies out of the stones. In Him all fulness 
dwells. He can do without all who can do without Him. 

176 



He has an inalienable right to all the endowments and 
opportunities and possibilities of all the children of men. They 
are all the benefactions of His hand. He calls them all into His 
service that, baptized with His benediction, they who follow Him 
in the way of the regeneration, suffering with Him here, may 
reign with Him hereafter. 

He is on His way to an everlasting and universal kingdom, 
and He would like to have all beliefs and conditions and powers 
rally at once to His side. He would like to have culture, that it 
may ascend to a dower of greener garlands and a richer heritage ; 
but He can do without it. He would like to have influence, that 
it may bear itself more grandly and impressively ; but He can do 
without it. He would like to have politics, that it may carry itself 
w T ith cleaner hands and higher impulses ; but He can do without 
it. He would like to have wealth, that it may invest in better 
securities and obtain larger dividends ; but He can do without it. 

He can do without any or all of these, essential as they may 
seem in human eyes to the accomplishment of great results. 

He will do without these sooner than abdicate His supremacy 
at their behest or to buy their favor. And to those, whether in 
the episcopacy or ministry or membership, who are for bending 
doctrine or holy-living or methods to carnal bidding — to catch the 
patronage of culture or influence or politics, He cries impera- 
tively, " Let Me alone : I need no patronage. I will not lower My 
standard to win recruits. I say to all unrenewed hearts, whether 
cultured or influential or political or wealthy, Except ye be con- 
verted, and become as little children, ye shall not enter into the 
kingdom of Heaven — Ye must be born again." 

All men are addressed by the Gospel of the grace of God 
with its calls to faith and renewal, and with its promises of for- 
giveness and immortality. It knows no distinction of class or 
condition or means among men, but regards all men as on the 
same level of impotence and necessity ; and it would uplift all 
men to the same plane of manhood in Christ Jesus. It has, how- 
ever, its own manner of renewal and uplifting ; and that manner 

177 



is their creation anew in Christ Jesus unto good works, on their 
confession of sin and suit for mercy at the throne of grace ; and it 
will not allow one sinner any easier or shorter way to its immuni- 
ties than another. Naaman must take his healing as any other 
leper, or stay a leper to the day of his death ; and a millionaire 
must take his renewal into the image of God along-side of the 
pauper, or stay an unforgiven sinner, weltering in the wrath of God. 

But, to its impotence and shame, the Church of Christ has 
not enough of the Spirit of Christ. Instead of calling to all sin- 
ners, "Except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish,' ' it lets 
down the bars before sinners of particular social grades, and says, 
' ' Here is a key to a private entrance. You can get in without 
contact with the mob at the main entrance, and take a box ; and 
nobody will know that you are other than you were." It hap- 
pens, thus, that unconverted men and women are smuggled into 
the sanctuary of the saints, and are seated in its high places, and 
shape its policy ; and the poor, simple Church finds that, instead 
of lifting them into Christian character and spirit, by her defer- 
ence, she has sunken to their level, and the household of Christ 
is won by the minions of the world. O, it seems to me that, 
louder than a volume of thunder, Christ's voice is crying to the 
Church, ' ' Let Me alone. Let Me have My own way. Let My 
word be your only rule of faith and practice. Quit your attempts 
to improve on My methods. Quit fettering Me with carnal con- 
ceits and plans. Take away the stones you have piled in My 
front. Tell the world to take Me on My own terms, or tell it that 
it can not take Me at all. Ye can not serve God and Mammon!" 

By such courageous and faithful procedure, a great apparent 
falling off, in fashion and fortune and profession, will come ; and 
the faint-hearted will tremble for the Ark of the Lord. But 
angels will clap their hands ; and Christ will gird His sword upon 
His thigh ; and His Spirit will have free course ; and His votar- 
ies will rally ; and His Church — redeemed, regenerated, and dis- 
enthralled, — will " look forth as the morning, fair as the moon r 
clear as the sun, and terrible as an army with banners." 

178 



It is not, moreover, genuine culture in the Church which de- 
murs to genuine godliness and strict conformity to its require- 
ments. Genuine culture always, when assuming Christian vows, 
is devoted and loyal to those vows and silent as the grave in the 
way of their criticism : for it is always devoted and loyal to all the 
vows it assumes, having assumed them intelligently, and as silent 
as the grave in the way of criticism of that to which it has com- 
mitted itself. Genuine culture leads to Christ, and seats itself at 
His feet. Pretence to culture leads from Christ, and waits for the 
word of Mrs. Grundy. The sooner the Church drives the pretence 
to the wall, the sooner will the real crowd her altars and tell her 
praise. The sooner the Church discards all worldly influences 
and methods, and puts on the spirit of power — the sooner she lets 
Christ alone to manage His own campaign, the sooner will she hail 
Him to His throne. 

It is not with avowed opposition that I plead to let Christ 
alone. It can do Him no harm. He has all power in earth and 
in Heaven ; and when His chosen hour has come, it will be only 
as the straw in the whirl of the torrent. 

It is with the Church I plead to let Christ alone — to cease 
fighting His battles with un-Christly weapons : to cease seeking 
to help Him in un-Christly ways : to cease seeking to win Him the 
world by uncrowning Him at its beck. Let Him have His own 
way in the evangelization of the world ; and the very things you 
now go begging for in vain, will hasten to Him with their gold 
and frankincense and myrrh. Commerce will carry His flag, and 
do business in His name, and help run His errands. Legislation 
will declare His mind, embody His Spirit and proclaim His rule. 
Science will own His Divinity, read His works, and, in illumi- 
nated letters, write His renown. Sin will pull down its colors, 
rush to His mercy-seat, and shout, " My Lord, and my God ! " 
The Church will put on cleaner garb, range holier planes, and rise 
from summit to summit, until one with the New Jerusalem com- 
ing down from God out of Heaven — prepared as a bride adorned 
for her Husband. 

179 



O, send the summons down the line, " Let Him alone!" 
Blow away the clouds which impertinent help and questionable 
methods have hung about Him ; and the Sun of Righteousness 
will sweep the horizon with healing in His wings. Cast down the 
barriers builded in His road by the hands of indifference and 
thoughtlessness ; gather up the stones which foolish, though well- 
meaning, zeal has piled in His way ; and the Prince Imperial will 
come marching to His throne, glorious in His apparel, travelling 
in the greatness of His strength, speaking in righteousness, 
mighty to save. Give Him a chance ; lift Him up from the earth, 
free from earthly helps as well as opposition ; and He will draw all 
men unto Him. The world can not withstand its ancient Con- 
queror. Infancy will bound into His arms, and bask in His 
smile. Manhood will confess His majesty and carry His image. 
Womanhood will feel His grace, as she touches the hem of His 
garment, and go forth a jewel of immortality. Old age will for- 
get its infirmity, totter into His presence, and turn to follow Him 
with the glee and vigor of unfading youth. Poverty will have 
His blessing, laugh in His bounty, and rejoice in a title to man- 
sions in the skies. And sorrow will take heart in His smile, and 
wipe away its tears to weep no more. The world over, all men 
will believe in Him — every ear bend to catch His footfall ; every 
eye brighten at His coming ; every hand extend to grasp His palm ; 
every heart leap to hail Him to its upper seat ; and every voice join 
in the chant, " L,o, this is our God : we have waited for Him : we 
will be glad, and rejoice in His salvation." 



180 



XX. 

44 And I said, Should such a man as I flee?" — Nshbmiah, 6:11. 

A familiar old adage, " Out of sight, out of mind," is not 
always true ; for the manly and noble-hearted never forget the 
friendships once formed, nor the interests once taken to heart. 
Once loving, they love to the end. 

As we recall the history of the times, Jerusalem has bitten 
the dust. Her legions are defeated, her Temple is dishonored, her 
treasury is emptied, and her walls are laid low. Her people are 
enslaved, or slaughtered, or sitting in tears amid their wasted 
homes. 

But one notable one, Nehemiah, is a captive in a distant city, 
environed with circumstances as comfortable and prosperous as 
are possible to a stranger in a strange land. He is in high esteem 
at court — is in honorable office, and is near the throne. His 
heart, however, is not amid these felicities and glories ; and he 
has no ear for their songs, no eye for their splendors, and no taste 
for their dainties. His studies are about his far-off land and 
Temple. His thoughts are among the tombs of his fathers ; and, 
unable to conceal his emotions from the monarch, and standing 
high in that monarch's favor, he obtains permission to go to his 
country and do his best to repair her wasted fortunes and reseat 
her on the pinnacle of her olden excellence. 

Full of consternation and hate, great are the animosity and ap- 
prehension of the enemies of Judah at the indication that her 
darkness may lift, and her sun once more mount the sky ; and 
they rally all their spleen and wit for the defeat of the patriotic 
and pious undertaking. Now they employ insult and irony, ask- 
ing, "What do these feeble Jews? will they fortify themselves ? 
will they sacrifice?. . . . Bven. if a fox go up, he shall even break 
down their stone wall ; " but through all the storm of sarcasm, 
the enterprise bravely holds on its way. Now they join hands to 
hinder the movement by force ; but the valiant cohorts of restora- 
tion stand steadily by their colors, with a tool in one hand and a 

181 



weapon in the other, through the day and the night ; and the enter- 
prise knows no arrest. Now they invite Nehemiah to a confer- 
ence in a neighboring village ; but he penetrates their treacherous 
solicitation, and replies, " I am doing a great work, so that I can 
not come down : why should the work cease, whilst I leave it, 
and come down to you ?" and the enterprise moves onward. Now 
they seek to alarm him with accusations of rebellion ; but he re- 
sponds, " There are no such things done as thou sayest, but thou 
feignest them out of thine own heart;" and the enterprise 
pushes on toward completion. Now they suborn Shemaiah,whom 
Nehemiah supposes to be his friend, to play on his regard for his 
own safety, and who urges, "Enemies will assault you in the 
night time ; let us conceal ourselves in the Temple, and secure 
ourselves from danger. ' ' 

Our text is the answer of the eminent saint and stalwart sol- 
dier to the dastardly suggestion. ' ' Should such a man as I 
flee? " — I, the governor, who ought to be an example of courage 
and fidelity ? I, on whose counsel and presence and valor so 
much depends? I, who have affirmed such devotion to my 
country, and such faith in my God? I, who have had such mar- 
vellous experiences of Divine grace and strength ? I flee ? — 
Betray my nation? Disgrace myself? Dishonor my religion? 1 
Provoke the Lord of all ? I flee ? O Lord, forbid the thought ! 

All, even the most genuine saints, encounter temptations. 
There are things and times which try the souls of even the most 
cultured and earnest friends of God. 

Conceding our obligation to advancement in the Divine life, 
and endeavoring to meet that obligation, we sometimes seem to 
gain so little ground. We can not assure ourselves that we are 
becoming more like Christ, or gathering meetness for the inherit- 
ance of the saints in light, or laying up treasure in Heaven. 
And such apparent lack of increase and progress is exceeding 
bitterness to those who earnestly aspire to be Israelites indeed, 
coveting the best gifts, and craving to be filled with all the fulness- 
of God. 

182 



Conceding our obligation to build up the Church, and help 
her to be a " glorious Church," without spot or wrinkle, we see 
her failing in character or steadfastness or zeal — her banners drag- 
ging in the dust, her fortifications falling down, her guns silent, 
her ordinances powerless, her people losing their identity among 
the unregenerate, and turning their backs to her enemies — Zion's 
good name a by-word and scoffing ; and such declension is an 
exceeding heart-ache to those who cry for the peace of Jerusalem, 
and long that her righteousness may go forth as brightness, and 
her salvation like unto a lamp that burneth. 

Conceding our obligation to help win the world to a knowl- 
edge of the Truth as it is in Jesus, we see it still lying in the 
arms of the wicked one. Iniquity abounds. Our own neighbor- 
hood discloses no evidences of awakening. Other neighborhoods 
seem to be stirred by no better impulses. Remoter regions send 
in no word of quickening. Far and wide Satanic flags flout the 
sky, and Satanic heels press the necks of the most of the mil- 
lions of our race. And such Satanic domination is a stunning 
woe to those who pant for the universal reign of the Prince of 
Peace, and thirst for the time when the God of the whole earth 
shall He be called. 

All these are specimens of the occasions which try the souls 
of the saints. But they are only specimens. They by no means 
exhaust the catalogue. From Egypt to Canaan trials throng the 
entire route of the ransomed. It is wilderness from the Red Sea 
to the Jordan — from conversion to coronation. " In the world ye 
shall have tribulation " is as Divine an announcement as is the 
announcement, " In Me ye shall have peace." Tribulation is as 
really and thoroughly a legacy of Christ to His disciples as is 
peace. It may be a blessing in disguise, but it is a blessing. 
1 ' Unto you it is given in the behalf of Christ, not only to believe 
on Him, but also to suffer for His sake." 

And beneath their trials, saints have sometimes temporarily 
broken down. Abraham equivocated. Job cursed his day. Moses 
spoke impatiently. Elijah fretted himself into the fancy that he 

183 



was the last of the faithful, and looked about for a chance to die. 
Jonah grew so angry that he imagined he could improve on the 
Divine administration. Peter denied all knowledge of Christ ; 
and all the disciples forsook the Master in His special stress. 

Ah, in the history of the Church how many successors these 
have had in their infirmities ! How many who have betrayed the 
Lord Who bought them with His own blood ! How many who 
have crucified the Son of God afresh, dishonored the grace of 
God, and done themselves momentous harm, if not wrought out 
their own irretrievable undoing ! 

But, " All hail the power of Jesus' Name ! " there is recov- 
ery from lapse in the Divine life. There is a path back home for 
the prodigal. Yet, all lapse is lost time ; and any lapse may be 
one from which there is no return. " Know therefore and see 
that it is an evil thing and bitter, that thou hast forsaken the 
Lord thy God." 

For there is no necessity that saints should fail in the time of 
trial. I know that no feebler or fewer enemies assail us than 
assailed the saints of earlier dispensations. Our foes are as many 
and strong and wily as ever. Toward the soldier of the cross the 
flesh is no friendlier, and Satan is no kindlier, and the world is no 
lovelier, than when the banner of Calvary was first flung to the 
breeze. I know that in ourselves we have no sufficiency for the 
dread engagement to which we are called. Either by force or 
strategy, going to war at our own expense, we will lose the field, 
and die, later or sooner, at the hands of the haters of the Cruci- 
fied One. Nevertheless, there is no need of failure. It is possi- 
ble to be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the 
Lord. It is possible to go from strength to strength, holding on 
our way, until every one appeareth in Zion before God. 

See our instructions, clearly defining the path of duty : so 
clearly mapping out the entire celestial route, that none need mis- 
take either our obligation or our privilege. ! ! If any of you lack 
wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally, and 
upbraideth not ; and it shall be given him. " ' ' The entrance of 

184 



Thy word giveth light : it giveth understanding to the simple." 
See our opportunities. Convenient occasions come crowding 
into our hands, and convenient occurrences come leaping down our 
paths, and convenient seasons come marching into our front ; and, 
in their improvement, we gather fresh laurels for ourselves, and 
hang fresh laurels about the brow of the Captain of our salvation. 
The arms of our hands are made strong by the hands of the 
mighty God of Jacob ; and every conflict is a new avenue to glory, 
and every toil is a new growth in grace, and every trial is a new 
meetness for the inheritance of the saints in light. Yonder gleams 
the proclamation of Him we follow, ' 4 1 know thy works : be- 
hold, I have set before thee an open door, and no man can shut it." 
See our responsibilities. In our keeping are our own in- 
dividual fortunes: for, "every one of us shall give account of 
himself to God ; " and the life of our families : for, " train up a 
child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not de- 
part from it ; " and the prosperity of the Church : for, 4 ' let us con- 
sider one another, to provoke unto good works ; ' ' and the weal of 
the world : for, ■ ' how shall they believe in Him of Whom they 
have not heard;" and the honor of God: for, "herein is My 
Father glorified, that ye bear much fruit." Tremblingly inquir- 
ing, "Who is sufficient for these things?" Holy Scripture re- 
sponds, ,'; God is able to make all grace abound toward you ; that 
ye having always all sufficiency in all things, may abound to 
every good thing. " 

See our recompense — here, a conscience void of offence toward 
God and man, a peace that passeth understanding, signs multiplied 
on signs that our labor is not in vain in the Lord, strength accord- 
ing to our day, and victory upon victory until the very air is 
resonant with victory; and hereafter. Heaven, with its clustering 
beauties and companions and crowns and hosannas and welcomes : 
all fragrant and luminous with the presence and smile of Him Who 
was made sin for us, that we might be made the righteousness of 
God in Him, and whose voice so often, amid the hail and smoke 
of conflict here, rouses us to new valor with its clarion call, " To 

185 



him that overcometh will I grant to sit with Me in My throne, 
even as I also overcame, and am set down with My Father in His 
throne." 

See our resources. In our interest gather the prayers of our 
fellow-saints: and "the effectual, fervent prayer of a righteous 
man availeth much ;" and the ministry of angels : for, " are they 
not all ministering spirits sent forth to minister for them who shall 
be heirs of salvation?" and the forces of the Holy Spirit: for 
" the Spirit also helpeth our infirmities ; ' ' and the intercession of 
the Son of God : for ' ' He is able to save them to the uttermost 
that come unto God by Him, seeing that He ever liveth to make 
intercession for them." 

Verily, there is no need of failure. " He that endureth to 
the end shall be saved ; ' ' and our instructions and opportunities 
and responsibilities and recompense and resources all call and 
encourge us to endurance. Syria is at war with Israel. Every 
plan of Syria is discovered to Israel as soon as it is formed. The 
Syrian king suspects treachery in his camp ; but his officers resent 
the accusation, and tell him that Elisha somehow gets their secrets 
and reports them : whereupon the king sends a host of chariots 
and horses to Dothan to arrest the prophet of the Lord. The 
servant of the prophet, looking out in the morning, and seeing 
the hostile array, grows wild with alarm and informs his master. 
The prophet calmly replies, ' ' Fear not : they that be with us are 
more than they that be with them ;" and prays, " Lord, open his 
eyes, that he may see ;" and, lo, the mountain is full of chariots 
and horses of fire — the cohorts of God mustered for the safety of 
His servant. And so, still, " as the mountains are round about 
Jerusalem, is the Lord round about His people from henceforth, 
even for ever. ' ' 

Then, up guards, and at them ! Should such men as we 
flee ? And I do not disguise the cost and struggle. I advise these 
young recruits, as well as remind these old veterans, that it is a 
campaign of fears within and fightings without. You will en- 
counter enemies in ambush, enemies in the field, and enemies in 

186 



the fort. Crosses will confront you, and fires will kindle about 
you. 

And will you, therefore, join the armies of aliens ? will you 
pull down your flag, throw away your arms, skulk into hiding- 
places, show the white feather, and sell out Christ and the Church 
and your own immortality ? 

A thousand times, No ! Each show yourself a man. Shout 
in the face of every foe, "Should such a man as I flee ? I, who 
know Whom I have believed, and am persuaded that He is able 
to keep that which I have committed unto Him against that day ? 
I, who have tasted of the heavenly gift, am made a partaker of 
the Holy Spirit, and have tasted the good word of God, and the 
powers of the world to come?" 

"I, for whose sake all nature stands, 

And stars their courses move ? 
I, for whose guard the angel bands 

Come flying from above ? 
I, for whom God the Son came down, 

And labored for my good- 
How careless to secure that crown 

He purchased with His blood !" 

Each has accepted his commission, received his bounty, and 
taken the oath of allegiance. Each has been called to the field, 
furnished with arms, and trusted with supplies. Each is under 
an obligation from which there is no escape. And with each is 
sufficiency for all to which he may be appointed in either action or 
endurance. 

Even childhood is no discharge. A great portion of Holland 
is lower than the sea, which is fended from the land by immense 
embankments. A lad going home from school one evening, along 
a sequestered path, and looking with unusual interest at the large 
dike he is passing, sees a small stream breaking through and car- 
rying away tiny particles of the bank. It is a little beginning of 
a vast catastrophe ; and the lad is too little to do all that is de- 
manded in the emergency. But, if he does nothing, the ruin 
will soon be beyond remedy ; and he clambers to the spot, puts 
his hand in the hole, and stops the stream for the time. Evening 

187 



darkens into night, and night flushes into morning ; and then his 
friends find him, and mend the breach ; but the task was beyond 
his natural strength, and a long and serious illness follows. 
Finally recovering, he is asked if he was not afraid through his 
fearful strain and watch ; and he answers, " No, I knew God 
would take care of me for taking care of other people. ' ' In the 
times of the martyrs, a child was cruelly scourged, and was urged 
by the minions of cruel ty to save himself by the denial of Jesus ; 
but he persistently refused. His mother and friends were looking 
on in helpless, prayerful sympathy ; and when at last the scourg- 
ing was over, he was delivered to his mother who, as she bathed 
and soothed his wounds, inquired, " Darling, how could you bear 
it?" and he replied, "All the while an angel stood by me, and 
pointed upward, and I kept looking upward, and was helped.'' 
See, children, how you too can have strength according to your 
day ! 

Even age is no disability. An old Christian woman desired 
the use of a school-house for a Sabbath-school ; and a director, 
who was an avowed unbeliever, stood steadily in her way. 
Finally he said to her, "Aunt Polly, I will not consent. You 
need not persist in your request." She replied, " Well, I believe 
I will get it." He said, "I'd like to know how." The old 
woman said, " The Lord will unlock it." The director answered, 
' ' He'll not get the key from me. " And the old woman responded, 
" I'll pray over it, and I've found that when I pray something 
gives way." And at the next intervie w he gave his consent, and 
stood by the enterprise against all opposition. See, old saints, 
what you can do, counselling with God, even when your natural 
force has abated ; and no longer reckon yourselves as having 
served your time ! 

Infirmity is no insufficiency. A good woman had a drunken 
husband, a crippled daughter, and an idiot son, and was herself 
bent nearly double with pain and toil, never knowing rest except 
in communion with God. One day a visitor asked her, "Are 
you not weary ?" and she replied, " Yes ; but the Lord means me 

188 



to work here. I've all eternity to rest in." And, with a cracked 
voice, according to human ears, but with a voice sweet as the 
cadence of an angel's song in the ears Divine, she sang : 

"When I've been there ten thousand years, 

Bright, shining as the sun, 
I've no less days to sing God's praise, 

Than when I first begun. " 

See, ye stricken ones, what flowers of devotion can bloom even in 
the hardest and lowliest lots ; and smile away your tears ! 

Insignificance is no release. A great Danish army many 
years ago invaded Scotland. Arranging a night assault, it crept 
stealthily onward ; and the Scots that night, dreaming of no 
danger, lay asleep with no sentinels out. The better to conceal 
their advance, the Danes came on in their bare feet , and, just as 
they were nearing the slumbering Scots, one unlucky Dane, with 
broad, uncovered foot, stepped on a bristling thistle. Forthwith 
he gave a roar of pain which rang out like the blast of a trumpet. 
Immediately the sleepers were alert, with their weapons in their 
hands. The enemies were routed ; and ever since then the thistle 
has been the National emblem of Scotland. During our war with 
England, there was close to the harbor of New London an old 
rope-walk, with its row of square windows fronting the water. 
In one of his cruises after our stores, a British admiral came 
near, and had an excellent opportunity for destroying the town, 
which was unguarded. Subsequently asked why he did not do it, 
he said, " I would have done it, if it had not been for that ugly 
old fort, whose guns entirely commanded the harbor." What 
scared him off was no fort, but an old rope-walk. 

There are place and use in the cause of Christ for every one 
of us — even the poorest and weakest : even the oldest and 
youngest ; and on each of us is His uniform. It behooves us to 
wear it worthily ; and, even if we can be and do nothing more, 
let us see that we are as efficient sentinels as that Scotch thistle, 
and wake the sleepers at their post ; or, even if we are superan- 
nuated old rope- walks, let us look like forts, and scare off the 

189 



assailants of the Truth as it is in Jesus by our godly carriage and 
conversation. Let us ever bear in mind that what we can do is 
the measure of what we must do, in order to the conservation of 
our own Christian character, and that less is disloyalty. 

" Arise, ye saints, arise ! 

The Lord our Reader is. 
The foe before His banner flies, 

And victory is His." 



190 



XXI. 

" Let us go forth therefore unto Him without the camp, bearing His 
reproach."— Hebrews, 13 : 13. 

A camp is correctly defined as a collection of huts or tents 
for the shelter of an army in warfare. All due caution is exer- 
cised, in its arrangement and supervision, against disease or onset 
or surprise. Its regulations are proverbially imperative and strict, 
and their violation is visited with immediate and impartial penalty. 
Ancient Israel, in its pilgrimage from Egypt to Canaan, lived in 
camp, under laws minutely directing both as to collective and in- 
dividual conduct. One of these laws, doubtless for sanitary 
reasons, provided that the bodies of the animals slain in sacrifice 
should be burned without the camp. 

According to Grotius, " Whatever was not lawful to be done 
in the camp, afterwards was not lawful to be done in the city." 
Therefore, that there might be conformity between His oblation 
of Himself and its prefiguring sacrifices, Christ was crucified with- 
out the gate of the city — thus being classed with criminals, who 
were not allowed to be executed within the walls of Jerusalem. 

By Biblical authority, Christians being described as soldiers, 
the Christian Church is properly rated as a camp ; and its earnest 
engagement in the work of Christ is rated as reproach, inasmuch 
as Christ was an object of hate and scorn because of His mission 
to destroy the works of the devil. ' ' The disciple is not above his 
Master, nor the servant above his Lord. " " Ye are not of the 
world, but I have chosen you out of the world: therefore the world 
hateth you. ' ' 

Christ is a Man of war. He has all power among the armies 
of Heaven, and among the inhabitants of earth. None ever 
hardened himself against Him and prospered. Giving ourselves 
to Him, in the acceptance of His atonement, and in the observ- 
ance of its conditions, He becomes our Salvation, and is henceforth 
our Director in dilemma, our Helper in impotence, and our Sup- 
porter in every stress. He is, moreover, the Commander and 

191 



Leader of His people. His sword is on His thigh. His arrows 
are sharp in the heart of the King's enemies. His army follow- 
ing wherever His flag flutters, He shall go forth conquering and 
to conquer, until all His enemies are put under His feet— until 
from His camp shall be heard the law of universal life, and all 
people, taught of His mouth, shall walk in His ways. 

A camp, as already defined, is an assemblage of conveniences 
and facilities for the temporary home of an army. It is fixed with 
an eye to its adaptation to the design of the campaign, to its 
easiness of defense, and to its ready obtainment of supplies. It 
is laid out in an orderly manner — each corps and division and 
regiment having its own regular quarters. It is properly guarded 
— due precautions being taken against advances of foes, develop- 
ment of insubordination, and inroads of sickness. It provides 
adequate instruction — all the discipline and drill essential to the 
knowledge and practice of soldierly tactics ; necessary rations — 
all that is requisite in the way of drink and food, and medicine 
and raiment and shelter ; and suitable rest — all needed opportunity 
for recuperation from the tear and wear of fatigue. 

It is not apparent, thus far in its description, that there is 
much shadow to camp-life — much to alarm or repel. It is rather 
an attraction. It must be borne in mind, however, that a camp is 
not an end. It is not merely appointed as a citadel in which a re- 
cruit may safely accomplish the period of his enlistment, or an inn 
in which he may find refreshment, or a school in which he may 
prosecute his studies. It is a means to an end. There is an enemy 
abroad ; and the camp only proposes to its occupants its conveni- 
ences and facilities until they have driven the enemy from the 
field. To drive the enemy from the field is the design of the camp, 
and the obligation of its soldiers. 

A Christian congregation is a camp — a camp of the Lord Jesus 
Christ. It is fixed with an eye to its adaptation to the design of the 
campaign ; for He that is for us is more than all that can be against 
us ; and when the enemy cometh in like a flood, the Spirit of the 
Lord lifteth up a standard against him. It is fixed with an eye to 

192 



its easiness of defense : for as the mountains are around about 
Jerusalem, so is the Lord round about His people, from hence- 
forth, even for ever. And it is fixed with an eye to its ready ob- 
tainment of supplies : for my God shall supply all your need ac- 
cording to His riches in glory, by Christ Jesus. 

It is laid out in an orderly manner. Here floats the Division 
flag of Methodism, and here that of Presbyterianism, and here 
that, each in its own place, of every organization of the followers 
of Christ. There is the site of the Pulpit, and there that of the 
Social Meeting, and there that of the Sabbath-school. This is the 
tabernacle of Exhortation, and this is that of Song, and this is that 
of Supplication. Walk about Zion, and go round about her : tell 
the towers thereof : mark ye well her bulwarks, consider her pal- 
aces ; that ye may tell it to the generation following. 

It is properly guarded. The fortifications are deep and strong 
and wide. The angels are on picket. The Lord of hosts is with 
us : the God of Jacob is our refuge. 

It provides adequate instruction ; for God Who commanded 
the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts, to 
give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of 
Jesus Christ. And it provides necessary rations ; for bread shall 
be given him, his water shall be sure. And it provides suitable 
rest ; for Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace whose mind is 
stayed on Thee. 

It is thus apparent that the Camp of the Lord Jesus Christ is 
no desolate and storm-torn bivouac. The Church of the Redeemer 
is no dreary, poverty-ridden enclosure — no lonely, want-stricken 
tenement. No good thing is withheld from it. It has all that it 
needs for godliness and for life. How amiable are Thy taber- 
nacles, O Lord of hosts ! A day in Thy courts is better than a 
thousand elsewhere. I had rather be a doorkeeper in the house of 
my God, than to dwell in the tents of wickedness. 

It should be borne in mind, however, that the Church is not 
the end of Christian life. Entering within the hallowed portals, 
we have not entered into rest. It is not the whole of godliness to 

193 



be in connection with the Church. Putting on its vows, we may 
not innocently sit down in ease and unconcern, satisfied with our 
immunities, or supinely waiting for our translation to the worship 
of those who sing before the eternal throne the song of Moses and 
the Lamb. The Church is a means to an end. A conspiracy is 
on foot in the universe for the dethronement of its God, and the 
overthrow of goodness. Back, in centuries long past, Satan in- 
augurated the foul revolt in a distant principality of the Divine em- 
pire. Early in the history of the human race, he set up his 
standard amid the bowers of Eden, and sought, alas, with too 
large success, to seduce the children of men into the unholy enter- 
prise ; and he is still busy on his nefarious mission, and immense 
hordes of the progeny of Adam are among his most earnest and 
willing troops. It is not all his way, however. The Son of God 
is marshalling the forces of law and truth in the interest of His 
Father's throne ; and every captive He takes, He brings into the 
camp, His Church, and trains him as a soldier in the war for the 
integrity of His Father's government and the redemption of the 
world. And it is the business of the Church which He has pur- 
chased with His own blood, not in cowardice or indolence to hug 
the camp, but to follow, without the camp, wherever its Captain 
leads the way. 

It is true that its Captain is in the Church — the Fount of all 
its blessings, the Giver of all its good, the Inspiration of all its 
hopes, the Perfection of all its strength, and the Source of all its 
supplies. Christ is all and in all. But He is not only in the 
Church. He will have all men to be saved. He is not willing 
that any should perish. He tasted death for every man ; and, 
thrilled with the same sublime purpose which carried Him to the 
cross, He cries, " Other sheep I have which are not of this fold : 
them also I must bring ; and they shall hear My voice ; and there 
shall be one fold, and one shepherd." It is His great ambition. 
Even now He has gone without the camp to bring them in. He 
is away after them, over the mountain and through the valley. 
He is following them through the shadow and through the sun- 

194 



shine. He is pursuing them in our congregations and in our 
families. He is pursuing them through all the haunts and homes 
of men. Yearning that all who have tasted of His grace shall so 
work together with Him that they shall not receive His grace in 
vain, as we sit here in ease, I behold in our very eyes His banner 
calling " Who will this day consecrate his service to the Lord ?" 
and hear His bugle shouting " Who is on the Lord's side? Let 
him stand forth." Shall the cry fall on unheeding ears ? Will 
we leave our Captain alone in the fray — His bounty in our hands, 
and His oath of loyalty on our lips ? 

Let us go forth therefore unto Him without the camp. Attentive 
to all the laws of the camp, observant of all the means and ordinances 
of the Church, let us endeavor, through their use, to hold fast the 
profession of our faith without wavering, and walk worthy of 
God, Who hath called us unto His kingdom and glory. But let 
us look also upon the things of others, not exhausting our concern 
either on the perfection of the camp, or on the perfection of our- 
selves. Let us not merely array ourselves in soldierly attire. Let 
us not content ourselves with merely an occasional dress-parade. 
Let us do more than merely don our uniform and play war. Let 
us put on the whole armor of God, that we may be able to stand 
against the wiles of the devil. For we wrestle not against flesh 
and blood : but against principalities, against powers, against the 
rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness 
in high places. 

Let us go forth on guard. Let us not sleep, as do others ; 
but let us watch and be sober. See then that ye walk circumspectly, 
not as fools, but as wise, redeeming the time, because the days are 
evil. 

Let us go forth on reconnoissance — feeling for the weak places 
of the enemy, and looking for opportunities to advance the lines 
of the Army of Redemption. As we have opportunity, let us do 
good unto all men. Let us let our light so shine before men, that 
they may see our good works, and glorify our Father which is in 
Heaven. 

195 



Let us go forth on skirmish. Finding anywhere a detach- 
ment of the foes of Immanuel, let us seek their capture in the 
Name that is above every name. As ye go, preach, saying, " The 
Kingdom of Heaven is at hand " — warning every man, teaching 
every man, that we may present every man perfect in Christ 
Jesus. 

Let us go forth on forlorn hope — not deterred by even 
uncommon exposure and peril : counting all things but loss for 
the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus our Lord ; and 
not counting our lives dear, so that we may finish our course with 
joy, and the ministry which we have received of the Lord Jesus, 
to testify the Gospel of the grace of God. 

Let us go forth on relief duty — aiding those who are hard 
pressed, caring for the wounded, and helping the faint. Bear ye 
one another's burdens. Comfort the feeble-minded, support the 
weak, be patient toward all men. Love the brotherhood. 

Let us go forth as an army of defense — beating back every 
assault, holding the ground in the face of every onset, and ready 
for every surprise. Contend for the faith once delivered to the 
saints. Endure hardness as good soldiers of Jesus Christ. Pray 
for the peace of Jerusalem. 

Let us go forth as an army of conquest. It is a disgrace for 
a camp to have nothing to boast of but its beauty and comfort and 
order. It is a disgrace for a church to gather no strength and win 
no victory. It is a backslidden church which is no more in force 
and valor today than twenty years ago. It only is a living church 
which is ever going on unto perfection, ever making converts to 
the Truth, and ever shaking down some stronghold of Satan in its 
front. Go, preach the Gospel to every creature. Go, and for 
Zion's sake, hold not your peace, and for Jerusalem's sake, take 
no rest until the righteousness thereof go forth as brightness, and 
the salvation thereof as a lamp that burneth. 

But, do you answer, there is danger in the soldier's life ? Do 
you plead, there is reproach outside of the camp? Do you say 
there is risk of bitter denial, of close fighting, of hard work, of 

196 



narrow rations, of painful days, of sleepless nights, and of 
unnatural death ? 

But we bargained for all this in the beginning of our Christian 
career. It was for this we enlisted: — covenanting to deny our- 
selves and take up our cross, giving ourselves living sacrifices 
unto God, and thoroughly understanding that we must through 
much tribulation enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. 

Christ, after Whom we are called Christians, bore reproach 
in our behalf, suffering without the gate : for, being in the form of 
God, and not thinking it robbery to be equal with God, He made 
Himself of no reputation, and took upon Him the form of a 
servant, and was made in the likeness of men ; and being found 
in fashion as a man, He humbled Himself, and became obedient 
unto death, even the death of the cross. 

Look ! beyond the camp, in the midst of His enemies, where 
the fire and hail of battle are falling thickest, is the white horse ; 
and He that sits on him has a bow in His hand and a crown on 
His head, and He goes forth conquering and to conquer. 
Hallowed form and radiant armor, we know Him well ! It is 
Jesus, the Son of God, Prince of the house of David, Saviour of 
the children of men — the Leader of the hosts of the Restoration. 
Let us consider Him Who endured such contradiction of sinners 
against Himself, lest we be wearied, and faint in our minds. 

Looking unto Jesus, the Author and Finisher of our faith, 
Who for the joy that was set before Him, endured the cross, 
despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the 
throne of God, let us not crawl among the trees, or fall behind the 
wagons, or get into the ambulances, or hide in the hospitals, or 
jump our bounty. Let us keep our oath. Let us live up to the 
obligations of our enlistment. Let us play the men. O, Thou, 
our glorious Leader, beat Thy reveille, and we will leap from our 
beds of indolence ! Lift Thy standard, and we will rush from the 
camp to stand by Thy side ! With Thee is honor, and safety, 
and victory. With Thee, to live is conquest, and to die is glory. 



197 



" Thy saints in all this glorious war, 

Shall conquer, though they die : 
They see the triumph from afar — 

By faith they bring it nigh. 
When that illustrious day shall rise, 

And all Thy armies shine 
In robes of victory through the skies. 

The glory shall be Thine." 



198 



XXII. 

"Let me die the death of the righteous, and let my last end be like 
his ! "—Numbers, 23: 10. 

At one broad bound this sentence, brief as it is, bridges the 
intervening centuries and leagues, carries us back three thousand 
years in the history of our race, and stations us in the far away 
plains of Moab, in the neighborhood of Jericho. 

At last the curse is lifting which doomed Israel to wander in 
the wilderness until those who had left Egypt in their maturity 
have atoned for their rebellion with their death ; and the nation is 
rolling forward, directly and steadily, to the land of promise. 

Countries on the line of its march are extremely anxious con- 
cerning its movements ; and Og, king of Bashan, and Sihon, king 
of the Amorites, are rash enough to breast the ongoing mass in 
the attempt to arrest its progress ; but the rushing torrent laughs 
at the attempt, puts the opposition on the run, and unhindered 
sweeps along. 

Darting along, it now approaches the dominion of Balak, 
king of Moab. Conscious of his own inability to cope with so 
formidable a force, yet determined to arrest it, and if possible to 
drive it to utter rout, he sends for Balaam, a soothsayer of the 
times, to assist him with his enchantments — beseeching him, 
'* Come now, therefore, I pray thee, curse me this people ; for 
they are too mighty for me : perad venture I shall prevail, that we 
may smite them, and that I may drive them out of the land: for I 
wot that he whom thou blessest is blessed, and he whom thou 
cursest is cursed.*' Blasphemous and foolish ascription to the 
creature, whose breath is in his nostrils, of the exclusive preroga- 
tive of the Lord of all ! 

Even though hindered by diverse Divine dissuasives and inter- 
positions, the avarice of the enchanter fights its way through them 
all ; and his love of lucre lures him to the disregard of the declared 
design of God, and to station himself, preparatory to the consum- 
mation of his bargain, on the high-places of Baal, where he may 

199 



see the utmost part of the people whose ruin Balak wishes him to 
work. 

How sublime and terrifying a sight hails his carnal, eager 
gaze ! "A rich, champaign country," says Hunter, in his Sacred 
Biography, "skirted by the silver Jordan, meeting the distant 
horizon ; the tents of Israel spread out like trees in the forest, and 
covering an innumerable multitude ; a whole nation beloved of 
God, and destined to conquest ; the spacious tabernacle, the habi- 
tation of the Most High, expanded in its midst ; and the cloud of 
glory, unequivocal proof of the Divine presence, resting upon it. 
How many objects to delight the eye, to swell the imagination, 
and to elevate the soul. No wonder the tongue of envy is charmed 
from its purpose ! " As Balaam drinks in the enrapturing vision, 
descries the indubitable indications of the Divine blessing and 
presence in the midst of the matchless host, discerns in the glory 
of today the richer glory of tomorrow, and reads in obedience the 
sure prophecy of a transcendent recompense ; it is no wonder 
that, beneath the dazzling hand of such an outlook, the desire for 
the favor which descends from God overcomes, for the moment, 
the lust for gold and the momentum of unrighteousness, and con- 
strains the cry, " Let me die the death of the righteous, and let 
my last end be like his ! '.' 

Neither is it any wonder that, looking forth upon the peculiar 
people, covered with the Divine care, and exulting in the Divine 
covenant, Balaam forgets his mission of malediction, and pro- 
claims, " Surely, there is no enchantment against Jacob, neither is 
there any divination against Israel .... How goodly are thy tents, 
O Jacob, and tlry tabernacles, O Israel !. . . .There shall come a 
Star out of Jacob, and a Sceptre shall rise out of Israel." Even 
so, God makes the wrath of men to praise Himself, and over-rules 
unfriendly schemes against those who give themselves into His 
keeping, to work out for them afar more exceeding and eternal 
weight of glory. ' ' Behold, the eye of the Lord is upon them that 
fear Him, upon them that hope in His mercy." " He that touch- 
eth you, toucheth the apple of His eye." ,'• None that trust in 

200 



Him shall be desolate." " The beloved of the Lord shall dwell in 
safety by Him : and the Lord shall cover him all the day long, and 
he shall dwell between His shoulders." " Who is he that will 
harm you, if ye be followers of that which is good ? " 

An attractive and desirable issue of mortal life is the death of 
the righteous. A righteous man is he who, discovering the empti- 
ness and insufficiency of carnal and temporal things, and feeling 
his own disability and unrighteousness, acknowledges the claims 
and desert of God ; admits the efficacy and necessity of the media- 
tion of the Son of God ; lays hold of the hope set before him, in the 
help of the Spirit of God; loves God with all his heart ; and, in 
all things, makes the law of God the rule of his life. 

As is well understood, a man of such belief and conduct arrays 
against himself a fearful antagonism. He exposes himself to all 
the fires and storms of earth and hell. Henceforth, in a larger or 
smaller measure, his lot is to suffer ; for, "Ye have need of pa- 
tience that, after ye have done the will of God, ye might receive 
the promise." The Saviour, while Himself enduring the cross, af- 
firms that the same experience awaits His disciples. The Apostles, 
while themselves enduring hardness as good soldiers, assure their 
fellow- Christians that they can hope for no easier or smoother path 
to the harp and the palm. The fortunes of the saints today, while 
seeking for glory and honor and immortality, show that the flesh 
is still alive, that Satan still goes about seeking whom he may de- 
vour, and that the world still holds its hostility to religion. The 
expression of this hostility differs with different circumstances and 
persons ; but the hap of the Lord is still the hap of the servant. 

Nevertheless, beaten, despised, ignored, mocked, wounded, 
as the righteous is, as he holds on his way, there is one period of 
his life universally coveted by his foes : — it is his end. Complet- 
ing his pilgrimage, going the w 7 ay of all the earth, joying in God 
through our Lord Jesus Christ, leaning on the arm of his Beloved, 
smiling in the face of the king of terrors, he so confidently and 
serenely passes down into the valley of the shadow of death that 
his most malignant persecutors fall in love with the manner of his 

201 



departure, and pray, ' ' Let me die the death of the righteous, and 
let my last end be like his/' 

But where is his monopoly? Is not death alike to all? Be- 
hold, laying them side by side, the bodies of the departed saint 
and the departed sinner ; and what is the difference ? As far as 
you are able to discern, is there any less paleness or silence or 
stillness in the one than in the other ? Come near, and scan each 
face : the coldness of marble is on the brow of each ; the eyes of 
each are closed in slumber which no sound can break ; the lips of 
each are locked beyond the call of business or the touch of love to 
open. Take the hand of either, and both will ignore your grasp. 

In the fact of the death of the righteous there is nothing 
peculiar. Though Enoch and Elijah were borne up the heavenly 
highway without the dishonor or pain of dying, and put on be- 
coming raiment for the bridal of the skies without waiting in the 
wardrobe of the grave, no other, however conformed unto the 
image of the Lord, shall thus pass in among the immortals, with- 
out tasting death, until they so scale the steeps of Paradise who 
are found alive upon the earth at the second coming of the Lord. 

In his death there is no diminution for the good man of what- 
ever naturally belongs to death. He experiences what others do 
as the tabernacle of mortality is taken down — the agonies of dis- 
solution, the distress of departure from familiar faces and occupa- 
tions and scenes, and the pain of removal from the darlings whose 
fortune has been his care, and whose love has been so largely the 
food and joy of his heart. 

Neither has the good man any charm against premature or 
unnatural death. He may die absent from home, or among 
strangers, or suddenly. He may die in the desert, or on the 
ocean, without leaving a grave where affection can drop a tear or 
leave a flower. He may die a martyr ; for his devotion to the 
Truth may hurry him to the stake, when denial of the Truth 
might have lengthened out his years. He may die in the bloom 
of youth, or in the prime of manhood ; for the axiom may have 



202 



an exception, and the righteous not live out half his days, and his 
sun go down at noon. 

Yet, even in the estimation of the unrighteous, there is some- 
thing desirable in the death of the new man in Christ Jesus — 
something to be sought in the last end of the pilgrim who has 
walked all his days arm in arm with the Prince of Peace. Even 
the sensual Moore sings : 

" Go, win? thy flight from star to star, 
From world to luminous world, as far 

As the universe spreads its flaming wall ; 
Take all the pleasures of all the spheres, 
And multiply each through endless years, 

One minute of heaven is worth them all." 

Can we so analyze this desirableness in the death of the 
righteous as to carry away some fair conception of its excellence ? 
How is it that the Christian's dying hour is arrayed in such 
attractiveness as to arouse the covetousness of those who are 
without God and without hope in the world, and stir them to 
longing for such an end of mortal being ? In what is his adieu to 
sense and time so precious ? What is it which so nerves and 
sustains and transports him w 7 hen heart and flesh fail, and the 
future for ever withdraws him from the present ? 

Is all delusion, or ignorance, or unconsciousness? Is it that 
reason has kindly abandoned the throne, and consigned him to 
the dominion of enthusiasm or insensibility in order that, beneath 
the spell, death may do its work unfelt and unperceived ? Nay, 
he has good reason for his carriage, so cheerful and elastic. His 
comfort will bear examination. His joy will endure the most 
searching scrutiny. 

It is the heaven in him, the guarantee of the heaven to come, 
which arranges that 

" The chamber where the good man meets his fate 
Is privileged beyond the common walks 
Of life : quite on the verge of heaven." 

Faith in Jesus Christ, as the incarnation of God, brought 
him into newness of life ; and, ever since, his life has been " hid 

203 



with Christ in God." He has lived by faith. He has stood 
by faith. He has walked by faith. He has made the Divine 
promises his daily food and refreshment, delighting in them 
in every gladness ; leaning on them in every stress ; and realizing 
in them an arm that never breaks, a heart that never fails, and a 
sun that never sets. And now it is seen that his is 

" A faith that keeps the narrow way 

Till life's last hour is fled, 
And with a pure and heavenly ray 

Illumes a dying bed." 

Faith bringing him into acceptance with God, through our 
I<ord Jesus Christ, he was simultaneously saved by hope ; and, 
ever since, hope has been the anchor of his soul, holding him 
"steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the 
Lord," in the midst of all the clouds and storms which have 
overhung his head or swept his path ; and now it is in lively 
exercise, breaking rifts through the darkness ; hushing the 
tempest ; lending him helps and solaces the world knows nothing 
of ; lifting him up to meet its descending fruition ; and showing 
sympathizing watchers by his bed that 

" A beam from heaven is sent to cheer 

The pilgrim on his road ; 
And angels are attending near, 

To bear him to their bright abode." 

Faith holding him to the bosom of the Lover of his soul, 
hope hiding him in the Rock of Ages, peace came in as his guest ; 
and, ever since, all has been calm within as summer evenings be : 
and now it is a peace which, in a higher sense than ever before, 
passeth all understanding. Certainly, I have conceded, earlier in 
the discourse, his liability to all that others experience in the 
striking of their mortal tents — the anguish of the break between 
body and soul, the sadness of the farewell to persons and things 
endeared by the association of years, and the sorrow and uneasi- 
ness of the parting with those for whom he has loved and toiled ; 
but peace fills his ascending soul. Many have been his deviations 
and omissions and sins, and often has he had to bewail his follies 

204 



and lament his transgressions ; but his life has been aimed at per- 
fection ; ever as he has lapsed he has confessed his error, made 
mention of the great Divine Propitiation, and diligently sought to 
err no more : and now, in nature's extremity, covered with the 
blood of the Lamb of God, sealed with the Holy Spirit of God, 
his peace is as a river — for he feels 

" It is not death to die,— 

To leave this weary road, 
And, 'mid the brotherhood on high, 

To be at home with God." 

Faith carrying him to the cross, hope keeping him close to 
the heart of the Crucified, and peace resting gently as the dew of 
morning, and as refreshingly, upon all the hills and vales of his 
being, — joyfully, triumphantly, he moves out upon his voyage. 
Friends who have come with him to the beach must part company 
with him now ; but he is not alone. Angels crowd around him ; 
Christ, long since enthroned in his heart, the hope of glory, folds 
him closer than ever to His great tender bosom ; friends, who have 
made the eternal haven before him, hail him from the other shore; 
light-houses, hung out from the heavenly hills, luminous with 
exceeding great and precious promises, fling their assuring mes- 
sages in his front : — the first proclaiming, ' ' I am with thee always, 
even unto the end of the world " ; and the second, " I am the 
Resurrection and the Life" ; and the third, " I give unto you 
eternal life, and you shall never perish, neither shall any pluck 
you out of My hand ' ' ; and then another and another, the whole 
way over : and the land of the redeemed welcomes him home for 
all the years of God. 

" When the weary ones we love 
Enter on their rest above, 
Seems the earth so poor and vast, 
All our life-joy over-cast? 
Hush, be every murmur dumb ; 
It is only—' Till He come.' *' 

It is ever thus with the departing saint. Fanned with the 
breezes, and ravished with the glimpses of his nearing immortality, 
he shouts with Stephen, "Lord Jesus, receive my spirit" ; or, 

205 



with Paul, "Thanks be to God, Who giveth us the victory, 
through our Lord Jesus Christ " ; or, with Flavel, "I know that 
it will be well with me " ; or, with Payson, * ' The victory is won 
— the victory is won for ever " ; or, with Abbot, " I see Heaven 
sweetly opened before me" ; or, with Bradford, ' ' We shall have 
a merry supper with the Lord tonight. ' ' 

" Who would not wish to die like those 

Whom God's own Spirit deigns to bless ? 
To sink into that soft repose, 

Then wake to perfect happiness ? " 

In this desire of the unrighteous for the death of the right- 
eous, there is assent to certain all-important Christian doctrines, 
ordinarily denied or ignored by unrighteousness. Death makes 
honest men out of us. At its approach, however previously con- 
cealed or suppressed, our genuine beliefs or fears or hopes will 
declare themselves. 

Whatever he may have declaimed or professed in the past, he 
who, anticipating his decease, cries, "Let me die the death of the 
righteous, and let my last end be like his, ' ' reveals his persuasion 
that death is not annihilation. If he believes it is, — that there is 
no being or consciousness beyond the grave, — why covet the exit 
of the Christian when it has no exemption from the natural 
incidents of the unchristian exit ? Why arrange for spring, when 
the frosts of winter are never to break, and its sceptre of ice is 
never to fall from its hand ? Why fit up for to-morrow, when the 
shadows of tonight are never to be withdrawn ? Why grow 
nerveless in view of the tomb, when the tomb shuts out for ever 
all chance of fear or harm or woe ? Why make inquiry about the 
country beyond the valley of this life's termination, about its 
inhabitants and peculiarities and terms of obtainment, when there 
is no such country, and the valley is endless, and they who go in 
nevermore go out ? Why, except that he feels he shall live for 
ever : and every cry of the dying for mercy, every messenger for 
the minister, is his breaking away from his infidelity ; his loosing 
from his worldliness ; his subscription to his faith in his im- 
mortality ? 

206 



He reveals his persuasion that he is accountable ; that after 
death there is the judgment ; that the same Being Who is the God 
of the life that is, is the God of the life to come ; that this state of 
being is a realm of probation ; that the future state of being is a 
realm of punishment and reward ; and that, as he has done good 
or ill here, he will have reward or punishment there. If these 
are not his beliefs, why this alarm about his crimes and delin- 
quencies, as they come flying in upon his memory ? Why this 
concern for their forgiveness ? Why this hunger for the righteous- 
ness of the Lamb told of in that Book he has constantly ignored? 
Why this yearning for garments washed in the blood of that 
Lamb? Why, except that he feels that we must all appear before 
the judgment seat of Christ ; that every one may receive the 
things done in his body, according to that he hath done, whether 
it be good or bad ? 

He reveals his persuasion that he has no opportunity after 
death for preparation for the dread assize. If there is in the sub- 
sequent scene of existence the mercy of which some dream so 
fondly, the opportunities of the second probation which some 
imagine, or the restoration of the Universalist, why this anxiety 
to prepare now to meet the Judge of all the earth ? Why this 
hurry to make provision now fur the rest that remaineth for the 
people of God? Why not behave calmly, and die quietly ? 
Why, except that he feels that it is now or never, and that now is 
the accepted time : now is the day of salvation ? 

He reveals his persuasion that his course of life has been out 
of harmony with the will of God into Whose presence he is hast- 
ening, and out of harmony with the life they live who, before the 
eternal throne, sing, ' ' Unto Him that loved us, and washed us 
from our sins in His own blood, and hath made us kings and 
priests unto God His Father ; to Him be glory and dominion for 
ever and ever.'* If not, why this giving up of the companions 
and pleasures and sins which all his days have been his all in all ? 
Why this utter withdrawal of reliance from the charities and forms 
and moralities in which he has prided himself? Why this search 

207 



for repose on the merits of the Christ he has so steadily re- 
nounced ? Why, except that he feels there is salvation in none 
other ? 

He reveals his persuasion that righteousness is the only sure 
reward, and that they only are wise who hide their lives with 
Christ in God. If not, why does he bewail his folly in waiting to 
be wise, his forgetfulness of the ordinances of Christianity, and 
his neglect of the admonitions and instructions and invitations of 
the Gospel ? Why does he beg the attendance of the friends of 
Jesus, crave their prayers, and implore their help to carry him to 
the cross and dress him for the Supper of the Lamb ? Why, ex- 
cept that he feels that only they who do His commandments shall 
have a right to the Tree of Life, and pass in to the welcome of the 
ransomed ? 

And he thus reveals his persuasion that they who serve God 
do not serve Him for naught ; that there is some profit in godli- 
ness ; that there is some value in the path, with all its denials and 
hardships and wars, which ends so grandly ; and that there is 
some wisdom in the religion which casts such lustre about the 
closing hour of mortal existence, gilds with such supernal radiance 
the dying scene of him who has made his peace with God, and 
turns his very dying into his everlasting enthronement. 

We draw no fancy picture. Biography is full of the realties 
we sketch. Altamont shrieks, " My principles have poisoned my 
friend ; my extravagance has beggared my boy ; my unkindness 
has murdered my wife ! and is there yet another hell ? Oh, Thou 
blasphemed, yet most indulgent Lord ! hell is a refuge if it hides 
me from Thy frown.' ' Chesterfield shrieks, " When I reflect on 
what I have seen and heard and done, I can hardly persuade my- 
self that all the frivolous hurry, bustle, pleasure of the world has 
any real existence ; but all seem to have been dreams of restless 
nights." Newport shrieks, "Oh, that I could lie and broil on 
that fire a hundred thousand years to purchase the favor of God!" 
Queen Elizabeth shrieks, "All my possessions for a moment of 
time ! " Byron shrieks, 

208 



" My days are in the sere and yellow leaf, 
The flower, the bud, the fruit of life are gone. 
The worm, the canker, and the grief, 
Are mine alone." 

Yes, fools men nay live ; but fools they do not die. They 
may in life and prosperity denounce and spurn the doctrines and 
proposals of the Gospel ; but this is only the bravado which cov- 
ers cowardice, or the ignorance which laughs where wisdom 
trembles. The clutch of adversity, like the hunger of the prodi- 
gal, brings them to their reason. Turn your eye upon the world- 
ling as blight begins to creep over his frame, as life begins to ebb, 
and the shaft of death is seen hunting for his vitals ; and how 
eagerly he glances about for some pass or provision for his journey. 
Watch him as the waters of the black, cold river beat in his ear, 
break about his feet, gather about his knees, hurry about his 
loins, and reach for his heart ; and how wildly, coveting the oil 
of the wiser virgins, he wails, " Let me die the death of the 
righteous, and let my last end be like his ! ' ' 

The petition, the wish, is of no avail for the unrighteous, 
continuing in his unrighteousness. Balaam's cry is the last cry 
of his dying conscience — the expression of the anxious, ineradi- 
cal concern of humanity about the future ; the involuntary ex- 
pression of the apprehension of humanity that death does not end 
all. It is an apprehension, act or talk as he may, no one is ever" 
able to smother. It is the tribute to righteousness which wicked- 
ness has always, later or sooner, to pay. It is the witness of the 
fact that, bluster or declaim or live as they may, men have only- 
one desire, one prayer, when they come to quit the world. Then, 
forgetting all else, turning from all else, the universal wish is, : 
11 Let me die the death of the righteous, and let my last end be 
like his! 5 ' 

In the wish there is nothing with which to find fault. It 
must be the wish of all who have not parted with the last frag- 
ment of their higher manhood. It is, however, not necessarily 
the aspiration of righteousness. It may be merely the constraint 
of fear, or only the expression of self-love. It maybe without 

209 



any regard for God, and without any respect for goodness : — the 
effort to get out of an existence, which must be left, in the best 
possible fashion : the endeavor to catch the comforts of the Gospel 
after all other comforts have fled, or the sinner has passed beyond 
their reach. Like Balaam, one may entertain for the moment the 
goodly longing, then give way to temptation, and perish in his 
sinfulness. Like the amiable young man who came to Christ, in- 
quiring so eagerly for eternal life, he may decline or neglect its 
offer for the paltry pelf of this life, and rush the more rapidly to- 
eternal death. 

It is a covetousness, a prayer, to be commended to every child 
of man ; but it is not enough. It carries not its own gratification 
and response. It must be so all-absorbing, so all-controlling, so 
all-inspiring, so all-moving, so all-shaping, as to make us anxious 
to do any act, endure any denial, go any length, make any sacri- 
fice, venture any struggle : — make us willing to ascend to Heaven, 
to descend to hell, to take the wings of the morning and wind our 
way to the uttermost parts of the sea, in order to reach the goal. 
It must declare and emphasize its sincerity and thoroughness in 
the living of the life of the righteous ; for ends and means are so 
linked together that not even the hand of Omnipotence can break 
them in twain. It must be shown in the daily, devout, trusting 
walk in all the ways of Him Whose favor is life, and Whose lov- 
ing-kindness is better than life. 

Let us go and be righteous : forsaking all unrighteousness, 
holding on to all virtue, and turning our faces from all that is 
earthly or foolish or wicked. Let us cease to do evil, and learn to 
do well : cleaving to the Lord with purpose of heart, cultivating- 
the mind of Christ, and setting our affections on things above. 

Life, as well as lip, will breathe our desire, ' ' Let me die the 
<ieath of the righteous, and let my last end belike his," and prove 
that the desire is genuine. Each day will glide brightly, sweetly, 
over our heads, made up of innocence and love. Each night will 
peacefully see us to bed, and send us to our bed "a day's march 
nearer home. ' ' Going down to our graves, a voice, sweet as the 

210 



music of angels, will whisper, ' ' Fear not, for I am with thee ; be 
not dismayed, for I am thy God ; I will strengthen thee ; yea, I 
will uphold thee with the right hand of My righteousness." 
Holden up by Divine ministries, we will descend the black valley, 
to find it luminous with celestial sheen, and dip our feet in the 
chilling Jordan, to find it pleasant as a bath of perfumes ; and, 
while friends are calling after us their sorrowing good-byes, and 
ministering spirits are waiting upon us with balm after balm of 
grace, we will pass up the everlasting slopes, attended with angels, 
greeted by friends and lovers who have passed up before us, and 
hailed by our Father to His own bosom, to companionship with 
the nobles of all ages and worlds, to the embrace of the fondly 
cherished of our hearts and homes in the world below, to the 
Golden City, to the feast of the redeemed, and to the Tree of Life 
from which no serpent shall ever charm us away, and from which 
no flaming sword shall restrain our feet. 



211 



XXIII. 

" For ye know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ that, though He was 
rich, yet for your sakes He became poor, that ye through His poverty might 
be rich." — II. Corinthians, 8 : 9. 

Bringing ourselves to the study of the theme of this passage, 
the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, we bring ourselves to the study 
of a theme of all others the broadest and deepest ; and yet of all 
others, to those who are in its experience, the dearest and richest. 
For, while on the one hand to measure its amplitude is beyond the 
capacity of angels, seeking to look into its mysteries and sublimi- 
ties ; on the other hand it is the source of all that brightens the 
sky, or cheers the path, or stays or stirs the souls of men. 

For different reasons, two classes of mind may be indisposed 
to its selection for pulpit discussion: the one affrighted by its 
immensity, the other dissuaded or repulsed by its familiarity as a 
topic. Certainly, we here are of neither class. It is a great and 
mind-taxing topic ; but men, and especially Christian men, follow 
on to know all that may be known, and are invited rather than 
repelled by the difficulties which confront them ; and an inspired 
teacher could not have assumed it to be an object of human knowl- 
edge, unless in some measure it may be the subject of human 
thought. It is a common subject of ministerial presentment ; but 
it is not, therefore, a worn-out one. It is not : nor will it be until 
some other lever than the grace of the Son of God is found to re- 
deem and uplift the fallen — until, without the Cross and its at- 
tractions and potencies, the children of men can atone for their 
guilt, cut out their sinfulness, escape their temptations, give death, 
their last enemy, his own death, and make their own way to realms 
of fadeless being and blessedness. Withhold the pulpit from talk- 
ing to the pew of the grace which is in Jesus Christ — confining it to 
lectures on Art, or History, or Literature, or Morals, or Nature, 
or Politics, or Science, — and there is no need for either pew or 
pulpit ; and the pew is a fool for taxing itself in the interest of the 
pulpit. 

212 



"Grace taught my roving feet 

To tread the heavenly road ; 
And new supplies each hour I meet, 

While pressing on to God." 

* ' God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord 
Jesus Christ, by Whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto 
the world." 

Magnifying this grace, and meaning to emphasize to the ut- 
most its magnitude and preciousness, meaning to make those to 
whom he writes realize to the utmost its value and wonderfulness, 
our author attempts no array of arguments or definitions. He es- 
says the illustration of fact by scenery ; and, flashing the glowing 
pictures in our eyes, he shouts in our ears, as if sure of the re- 
sponse of our hearts, "Ye know the grace of our Lord Jesus 
Christ, that, though He was rich, yet for your sakes He became 
poor, that ye through His poverty might be rich." 

A canvas stretching back from Bethlehem, twenty centuries 
ago, through all the eternity behind, attracts first our gaze ; and 
there is the picture of our Lord Jesus Christ as He was. As He 
was. Bethlehem, then, is not His birthplace. He is not just born 
as angels chant and shepherds hail His appearance among men in 
that night of hallowed memory — angels crying, ■ ' Glory to God 
in the highest, and on earth peace, good-will toward men," and 
shepherds saying, ' ' Let us now go even unto Bethlehem, and see 
this thing which is come to pass, which the Lord hath made 
known unto us. ' ' He has been before this glowing hour from 
which the history of mankind is to take a new shape. 

But when has He been ? From this very hour of His discov- 
ery to human eyes continuously and indefinitely back into the 
past : for, far back as their knowledge extends who throng His 
cradle, there are no data by which to fix His beginning to be. 
Moreover, this is the Apostolic aflirmation in the words of our 
study, or it is beyond our comprehension — it is incapable of in- 
telligent and satisfactory exegesis. Nor is it true that He was ever 
rich, unless it was prior to this hour. Proceed with the witnesses 
to the contrary, if there are any. At what period of His incarna- 

213 



tion was it true ? At what period of His incarnation did it cease 
to be true ? What signs of wealth adorned His infancy — beasts 
lending it their manger, and lowing for its lullaby? Or, what 
signs of wealth brightened His life — dependent on the charities of 
others, hidden the most of its length in obscurity, and, where it 
was not hidden, a scene of toil and trial? Or, what signs of 
wealth softened His death — all His effects, His raiment, in the 
hands of His executioners, His disciples dismissed with merely 
His peace as a legacy, and His mother given over to a friend as 
poor as Himself for comfort and keeping ? He has been before 
His advent into our brotherhood as the Babe of Mary — before His 
revelation to our flesh and blood as the expected Messiah. 

But where has He been ? Earth is not the only dwelling- 
place of being, or humanity its only form. Ere, long ere, earth 
began its circuit through the skies, the skies were aglow with other 
worlds, and other immortal and intelligent natures were at home 
in those worlds. Free of all these worlds, now in one, now in 
another, His particular residence in that one where Deity has its 
special manifestation, has He been previously to this uncovering 
of Himself in Judea. 

But while has He been ? According to His own biography, 
" Before Abraham was I Am," He was alive two thousand years 
earlier than His sonship to Mary ; and once ascertaining His 
being earlier than His incarnation of Abrahamic loins, earlier 
than Abraham's time, we have no cause for discarding any allega- 
tion concerning Him of Scripture — Scripture declaring that it is 
written to testify of Him. Having this inspired footing, we have 
no difficulty in accepting Job's averment, u I know that my 
Redeemer liveth : " and none in identifying Him as the Angel of 
the Covenant traversing patriarchal times in human vestments, as 
if trying them on in preparation for their use in times still far 
ahead : and none in recognizing His voice as Wisdom cries, 
1 ' Before the mountains were settled, before the hills was I brought 
forth : while as yet He had not made the earth, nor the fields, nor 
the highest part of the dust of the world. When He prepared 

214 



the heavens, I was there ; when He set a compass upon the face 
of the depth : when He established the clouds above : when He 
strengthened the fountains of the deep : when He gave to the sea 
His decree, that the waters should not pass His commandment : 
when He appointed the foundations of the earth : then I was by 
Him, as one brought up with Him : and I was daily His delight, 
rejoicing always before Him : " and none in turning to Him in 
homage as the Word we mean when saying in the language of 
the Epistle to the Hebrews, ' ' Through faith we understand that 
the worlds were framed by the Word of God, so that things which 
are seen were not made of things which do appear : ' ' and none in 
uniting with John as he utters his creed, " In the beginning was 
the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God." 

He has been rich. As we look upon Him there in His 
humiliation, apparently a root out of dry ground, the daily target 
of insult and persecution, without one who can enter into His 
mind, without form or comeliness, without a place to lay His 
head, it does not seem so ; but He was rich as that picture 
represents. 

By rich we generally understand one who has abundance of 
this world's goods — an abundance beyond the supply of all his 
wants. In this connection, it is employed as the only possible 
term in the meagre vocabulary of earth with which even to sug- 
gest an idea of the original wealth of this homeless Pilgrim. To 
get its import, the word must be lifted high above its ordinary 
significance. 

He was rich in His being. He was not always this seeming 
creature of a day, with only a few short years on which to reckon 
in the land of the living. From before the mountains were 
brought forth, or ever the earth and the worlds were formed, 
through all the ages of the everlasting God Who is without 
beginning of days, He has been living. 

He was rich in His constitution. Babe, helpless Babe, as you 
have seen Him, Man of sorrows as you have seen Him, miserable 
and self- impotent sufferer as you have seen Him, it was not ever 

215 



thus. He was not only in the beginning, with God, but He was 
God — God in all His attributes and prerogatives : God in all His 
belongings and qualities : God in all His honors and possessions : 
God over all, being all God is, doing all God does, having all God 
has, owning all God owns, and receiving all God receives. 

He was rich in His dominion. Buffeted as He was by cruel 
hands, hurried as He was into the court of a despot by fiendish 
police, nailed as He was to the cross by miserable hirelings, there 
was a period when He hurled the master of these slaves over the 
battlements of Heaven, and when all the mightiest of the might- 
iest of the universe quailed at the sight of His eye. By manu- 
facture there is wrought out the clearest and most inalienable 
title to ownership or possession : it is a patent-right which holds 
against all claim. By the establishment of the fact by any indi- 
vidual that a particular piece of handiwork was made by him in 
his own time, out of his own materials, it is his beyond disposses- 
sion. By this most indefeasible right Jesus Christ is I^ord of all : 
of the earth, for He fashioned it, and hung it on the sun ; of the 
moon, for He fastened it in its orbit ; of the stars, for He sprinkled 
them through the skies ; and of the sun, for He hath set a taber- 
nacle for it from which it lights up the path of earth and moon 
and stars through the heavens. The other worlds, lying outside 
of our system of worlds, moving through spaces so far away that 
not even a ray or sound has told their fortunes to our eyes or ears : 
of these, too, He is Artificer and Disposer. The furniture of 
matter and spirit of all these crowding hosts of worlds : of this, 
too, He is Author and Director. The world, the metropolis of all 
worlds, the seat of government of the universe, the throne-room 
of those intelligences who have never fallen and of the ransomed 
from among the fallen children of men, the home of our hopes, 
with all its crowns and dominions and harps : of this, and of 
these, too, He is Maker and Monarch. The world which was not 
in His original design, the necessity of which disfigured His plan 
of creation — the prison prepared for the devil and his colleagues in 
the great rebellion, and turned into a prison for those of the 

216 



human family who will not come to the fountain filled with blood 
that they may wash their sins away : of this, and of these, too, 
He is Maker and Master. His kingdom ruleth over all. 

He was rich in praise. Despised and rejected in His incar- 
nation, derided by His enemies, denied and doubted by His friends, 
dressed in mock robes of royalty by the managers of His death, 
scorned as unable to help Himself on the cross by His persecutors, 
He once lived among hosannas. Animation and inanimation 
clapped their hands in His presence. His praise was exhaled from 
flowers and plants, floated on the breeze, gleamed in the sunshine, 
poured forth from all the lips of nature, and rung its bells from 
all the towers of Providence. To pay Him tribute was the one 
business of Cherubim and Seraphim — the one concern of all the 
hosts of Heaven. The one anthem of the celestial choirs, the 
one song of the celestial mansions, was, "Holy, holy, holy, is 
the Lord of hosts : glorious in holiness, fearful in praises, doing 
wonders !" 

He was rich. His being independent, self-sufficient, and 
unoriginated, where could it have boundary or lack ? His con- 
stitution the perfection of Godhead, where could it have limit or 
need ? His dominion girdling eternity and infinity, where was 
there tribute He could not gather ? His praise sweeping up from 
the tongues of all ages and spaces, where could He w r ant for 
halleluiahs ? 

The study of this first picture has carried me away and 
beyond my depth. I am in the midst of scenes too high and wide 
for me. Spellbound, I have undertaken to discourse of things of 
which it is not possible to tell. And so, oppressed with the 
consciousness of my inability, and praying pardon for my venture, 
I turn from the daring study of the riches pouring their treasures 
into the lap of Him Whose name is above every name, to see that 
scene when, catching the wail of the stricken earth, " Who shall 
deliver me from this body of death," He discarded His being, 
dismissed His constitution, disrobed Himself of His dominion, 
hushed His praise, and, 

217 



" With pitying eyes the Prince of grace 

Beheld our helpless grief : 
He saw, and, O amazing love ! 

He ran to our relief." 

A canvas stretching forward from Bethlehem, on the first 
Christmas day of the universe, through thirty-three or four fol- 
lowing years, now unrolls ; and there is the picture of our Lord 
Jesus Christ as He is in the Apostolic study. And what a picture 
it is upon which we gaze ! What different feelings and thoughts 
it awakens ! Shade after shade has dropped its curtains ; and He 
Whom we have seen as God in all the excellence and supremacy 
of Godhead, and to Whose draft all the treasuries of the universe 
have held their doors wide open, now comes into our vision 
acquainted with grief, a Man of sorrows. That rich Lord is this 
poor Man. He became poor — in this connection, what a teeming 
word ! 

As affirmed of Him, we have defined rich to mean more than 
it [can mean of the richest man ; and, affirmed of Him, poverty 
means more than it can mean of the veriest pauper upon whom we 
have lavished our gifts and sympathies. It is the catalogue of all 
the circumstances of His descent and humiliation and want — the 
list of all the calumnies and indignities and sorrows which He 
endured as the suffering Son of God. 

It is His abandonment of all the riches of which He was 
possessed. Existing from all eternity, He begins to be. Not 
deeming it robbery to count Himself equal with God , He divests 
Himself of the fashion of Divinity. The Lord of all, He empties 
Himself of His priority. The object of universal adoration, He 
foregoes the incense fragrant with blessing, lays aside the wreath 
of praises homage has hung around His head, and turns from the 
glory which He has shared with His Father and the Holy Spirit. 

It is His assumption of human nature. Does he impoverish 
himself who descends from loftier to lowlier condition among 
men ? Does Charles the Fifth in his descent from the crown to 
the convent ? Does Napoleon in his descent from the empire to 

218 



exile ? Does the Russian nobleman in his descent from the palace 
to the Siberian mines? Then, measure if you can His impover- 
ishment Who exchanges Divinity for humanity, and gives up 
Godhead for manhood. 

It is His assumption of humanity in its humblest rank. He 
enters the narrows of poverty. He takes the form of a servant. 
He lives from day to day in the fields, or on the hills, or on the 
shore, or on the hospitality of neighbors, or on the kindness of 
strangers ; for He has no income of His own, and His family, 
though of royal lineage, has fallen into decay. He dies at the 
expense of His enemies, and finds His burial in the vault of a 
generous rich man. 

It is His exposure to all the possibilities of sinless human 
nature. He was without blemish and without spot. In Him 
there was no fault. And this was true of the angels who kept not 
their first estate, as they were created. And it was true of man 
as he came from the hand of God. In every moral agent there is 
the abstract possibility of disloyalty to goodness, or neither angels 
nor men could ever have lapsed. It is an abstract possibility that 
the second Adam, as well as the first Adam, might have lapsed. 
It is a fact that after humanity had lapsed, it became liable to 
infirmities and pains to which it had not previously been liable ; 
and that to these infirmities and pains those who are found in its 
likeness are liable, even though they have committed no personal 
transgression of the laws of righteousness. It is, therefore, a fact 
that He, clothing Himself with humanity, though not personally 
doing any violence to the law of righteousness, encountered its 
fortunes of disability and sorrow, and felt some of their pangs ; 
for He was the subject of hunger and thirst, of pain and weari- 
ness, and of reproach and temptation. 

It is His suffering of the desert of sinful human nature. He 
was made to be sin for us, Who knew no sin : that we might be 
made the righteousness of God in Him. It was for the suffering 
of this desert that He put on human nature ; and how completely 
and severely it emptied on Him all its vials ! What eye can com- 

219 



pass the indignities and woes which crowded the years of His pil- 
grimage through mortal scenes ? What line can fathom the depth 
of that fearful sea through which He struggled from His departure 
from His throne to His tomb ? What tongue can tell that poverty 
which cast its pall upon the loftiest Heaven, and clutched the Son 
of God — a poverty so black that its gloom could becloud the 
brightness of Divinity, so keen that its barb could pierce a fault- 
less heart, so measureless that its cloak could cover an infinity of 
crime, so potent that its might could batter down the gates of 
death and hell, and so precious that its price could pay for the re- 
lease from the everlasting punishment due them of a world of 
sinners ? 

It is His visitation with the eclipse of His Father's face. A 
dogmatic exposition of this eclipse may not be asserted by any 
mortal mind or speech. It can not be declared that the Father 
absolutely drew a cloud between Himself and the Son Who 
through all the aeons behind had never before met with such a 
fortune ; or that the Son for a period had such a sense of the enor- 
mity of human sinfulness, and of the woe of its sequel, as in its 
darkness to lose sight of His Father's face ; or that for 
a season He actually staggered under the equivalent of all 
the weight of the eternal curse of all the sins of all the sinners 
through all the years of time. But, for three fearful hours, as He 
hung upon the cross, a horror of great darkness wrapped the 
whole land ; and, amid its terrible shadows, He cried with a loud 
voice, * ' My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me ? " 

O, was He not poor Who for earthly tabernacle had come 
down from heavenly throne? Who from all the delights and 
honors and prerogatives of Godhead had descended into the en- 
durance of all the inferiority and shame and sin and woe of man- 
hood ? Whose greeting from the manhood in whose interest He 
came was a bitter life, a cruel death, and a felon's grave? Whose 
days were draped in grief? Whose nights were wet with tears? 
Whose place of secret devotion was a scene of agony to sweat and 
blood ? Whose season of intensest misery was made an htmdred- 

220 



fold more miserable by the desertion of His chosen friends? 
Whose death- bed was a cross, with a dying malefactor on either 
side ? And Who suffered eternities and infinities of deaths in the 
hiding of His Father's face? 

" O Lamb of God, was ever pain, 
Was ever shame like Thine ? " 

Amazed, oppressed, sick, I inquire the reason of this stupen- 
dous humiliation. I inquire, What enemy, or imprudence, or 
wickedness, has achieved this great misfortune — wrought this 
great reverse ? What enemy has carried off, what imprudence has 
squandered, what wickedness has wasted, all the vast possessions 
of the Son of God? Inquiring, I learn that, though justly predi- 
cate of the overthrow of human fortunes, such questions find no 
solution of the present mystery. 

Pressing my inquiry, I learn that all this abasement, and 
expatriation, and sacrifice, has been of the illustrious Sufferer's 
own accord and action, and in the interest of other parties. I am 
increasingly perplexed. Was it for faithful allies who had borne 
arms for Him in some assault upon His dominions, and to whose 
assistance He was bound in any conflict which should assail them? 
Was it for some loyal province which had maintained its integrity 
when treason was striking for His throne, and to the defence of 
which, in every strain, He was pledged by solemn covenant? 
Was it for some neutral realm, always fully and generously re- 
specting His rights, but now unrighteously seized by marauders ? 
No : though in either instance it would have been conspicuous 
goodness for such a Personage to have cast Himself, at such a 
venture, into the breach. 

Pressing my inquiry farther, I learn that His interposition, 
with all its dreadful outcome, was in the interest of rebels — rebels 
against Himself : rebels whom He had brought into being, whom 
He had cared for with more than royal munificence, and upon 
whom He had never levied more than nominal taxes. 

Pressing my inquiry still, I learn that it is men who are the 
objects of His merciful intervention. Behold their poverty — 

221 



created in His image and after His likeness, through His own 
design and work : having in their possession every blessedness of 
which they are capable, and of which they can rationally conceive 
as possible ; made to hold this heritage for ever, and to exult for 
ever in its increase as in its use they shall ascend to larger capacity 
for its increase ; they have lost it all by their own voluntary sur- 
render. Duly forewarned that its continuance is conditioned on 
their continued loyalty, and that unfaithfulness will provoke dis- 
inheritance, they are reaping as they have sown. Lost it all, and 
worse ! Conscience is flaying them alive. Memory is a night- 
mare. Numerous needs distress, and numerous woes sting them 
to the quick. No outlook kindles hope. The future is as black 
as is the present. The wrath of God abideth on them for ever. 

Pressing my inquiry still, He Whom, in that first picture, we 
saw so rich in all the wealth of God, stoops into all the straits of 
that abject poverty, gazing upon which in that second picture, 
overwhelmed with the spectacle, we have held our breath : and 
stoops that men may again have wealth, and have it more abun- 
dantly. By the changeless constitution of the government against 
which they have rebelled, their poverty is poverty to the death 
that never dies. It exacts a satisfaction which requires eternal 
poverty for infinite transgression, as in all transgression against 
eternal and infinite Majesty and Righteousness. To meet this 
requirement, the Lord Jesus Christ, with heart most wonderfully 
kind, dispossesses Himself of His riches, folds Divinity and human- 
ity into one nature, hastens into the rebels' stead, lays Himself out 
to receive the rebels' stroke, and, His Divinity making Him a 
competent sacrifice, and His humanity making Him a proper 
sacrifice, makes, in a brief period, an eternal and infinite satis- 
faction. 

Pressing my inquiry one more step, and both the reason and 
the result of His stupendous humiliation blaze upon my ravished 
vision, in light far exceeding the light of any morning which ever 
marshalled its sunbeams on earthly sea or shore. Barrier after 
barrier is broken down, debt after debt is paid, disability after dis- 

222 



ability is removed, and man's entail of poverty is taken away. 
Chance after chance is assigned, help after help is given, loan after 
loan is made, and man may be rich again. Coming, in belief and 
penitence and plea, to the throne of grace, making mention of the 
poverty and righteousness and worth of the Lamb slain from the 
foundation of the world, and presenting His endorsement, man is 
rich again. " Justified by faith, we have peace with God through 
our Lord Jesus Christ ; by Whom also we have access by faith 
into this grace wherein we stand, and rejoice in hope of the 
glory of God. And not only so, but we glory in tribulation also : 
knowing that tribulation worketh patience ; and patience experi- 
ence ; and experience hope ; and hope maketh not ashamed : be- 
cause the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy 
Ghost, which is given unto us." 

Thus, here is the key which lets us in to the understanding 
of those two pictures, and of their relation to each other, and of 
their relation to the recovery of man's lost heritage, and to his 
uplifting to felicities and glories for which he had never hoped. 
11 It is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ 
Jesus came into the world to save sinners. ' ' 

Amazing grace ! Love surpassing love of mother for the son 
of her womb ! 

" Grace first contrived a way 

To save rebellious man ; 
And all the steps that grace display, 

Which drew the wondrous plan." 

Amazing grace ! Ever and anon, as its Author and Finisher 
looks through our hearts and lives, and sees how we prize it more 
than all we prize beside, may He whisper to our increasing bliss, 
" Ye know the grace of your Lord Jesus Christ, that, though He 
was rich, yet for your sakes He became poor, that ye through His 
poverty might be rich. ' ' 

Amazing grace ! Beneath its cover may we live every day 
our lives long, and in its riches every day rejoice. Borne on its 
breast, fed on its fulness, and happy in its prospects, may we 

223 



finish our pilgrimage ! And, cheered with its gladness, and lighted 
with its lamps, and strengthened with its ministries, may we pass 
in to the glory which is its immortal fruitage ! 



224 



XXIV. 

11 Behold, the days come, saith the Lord God, that I will send a famine 
in the land, not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for water, but of hearing the 
words of the Lord."— Amos, 8 :11. 

A false notion has had wide currency in the world concerning 
the character of God, belittling His justice in the honor of His 
mercy, and exalting the one perfection at the expense of the 
other. Doubting his ability to endure unscathed the flame of 
justice, man seeks for consolation and escape in the fancy that 
mercy will so bias the mind, or blind the vision, of the Judge of 
all the earth, as to secure the immunity of the sinner at His bar. 

But it is all a fancy, thin as air. Beyond dispute, man can 
not, in himself, fulfil the law, or furnish satisfaction for his diso- 
bedience, or put out the fires which encircle its dishonored 
tribunal, disclosing the malignity of transgression, and scorching 
with quenchless vigor the conscience-smitten, helpless trans- 
gressor. Justice does not abate any of its demands or dues : its 
dignity must have reparation for every insult and neglect. There 
must be the death of some becoming victim. Without the 
shedding of blood there is no remission of sin. 

It is an error to imagine that, as the sinner is undergoing the 
inquest, mercy hovers near, looking at the scales, and ready, 
Brennus-like, to hit the beam, and reap by fraud what an honest 
weight will not return. Its pleadings could never have availed to 
human rescue, had not the Son of God, in human likeness, 
ascended the altar and bared His bosom to the curse ; nor does 
even His gracious interposition let mercy have its way, except as 
there is individual appropriation of His interposition, and indi- 
vidual doing of His will. 

It may be a beautiful and harmless form of speech, setting off 
a sterile prayer, to style mercy the ' ' darling attribute ' ' of God ; 
but it is not true. And it is doubtful if it would be clothed with 
such lustre as it does wear, if justice had not demanded so costly 
a sacrifice as the Lamb of God. The one can not be dearer than 

225 



the other, if the other rates so high in the estimation of the 
Father as to command the sacrifice of His Son for its pacification. 

It is true that God delights in mercy, that He is not willing 
that any should perish ; but at the bidding of justice, He can 
laugh at the calamity of those who ignore His government or 
grace, and mock when their fear cometh. God is a consuming 
fire, as well as love. 

It must be insisted : one attribute of the Godhead can not 
conflict with another. It is the harmony of His perfections which 
is the excellence of Deity. Prove the absolute monarchy of any 
one of His perfections, and you shear Him of His perfectness — you 
raise a war among His perfections, making that one lord, and 
slaves of all the rest. Through the mediation of the Messiah, 
mercy is meant to have free course in the redemption of man ; but 
man may turn the ascendancy over to justice, and justice blight 
with death what mercy wished to brighten with life. 

Many a long year Israel has been the favorite child of God, 
the peculiar object of His concern and delight. But its people 
have waxed fat and kicked. Calamity has led them to reforma- 
tion ; but reformation has been short-lived : and after long en- 
durance of their constantly recurring rebelliousness, the patience 
of Jehovah turns to wrath. He resolves to leave them alone to 
work out their destruction ; to interfere no more, with correction, 
or invitation, or prophet, with their waywardness ; and to with- 
draw those revelations which have been their life and truth and 
way, but which they have so persistently disregarded. " Behold, 
the days come, saith the I^ord God, that I will send a famine in 
the land, not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for water, but of 
hearing the words of the I,ord." 

It seems to be the severest judgment with which Divinity can 
visit humanity during the period of its probation. It is the last 
with which offending Israel is smitten, after many previous strokes 
have fallen in vain. Its history has long been a history of forget- 
fulness, ingratitude, and presumption. Many a manifestation of 
His displeasure has it called from the hand of God. Many a pun- 

226 



ishment has He sent to arrest its evil courses, and bring it back to 
loyalty. But each, at best, has wrought only a temporary arrest 
and return. Out of each return Israel has gone off into a new 
revolt. And He Who is so slow to wrath, casts about Him for 
some new and untried bolt with which to strike. 

Let us draw aside the curtain, gaze in on the council-chamber 
of the Trinity, and listen as Jehovah recites His former adminis- 
tration toward the nation of rebels, and sketches His future line of 
treatment : — " I have employed every easier method of disaster. 
I have marshalled every other misery. I have sent famine, and 
pestilence, and sword : but without result. They have abused My 
goodness, laughed at My reproofs, and transformed their peculiar 
standing in My sight into a justification of their disobedience, 
pleading their sonship in vindication of their right of sinfulness. 
I will abandon them to themselves. I will banish them from My 
favor. I will dissolve our connection. I will hide My face from 
them. I will silence My oracles. I will send a famine among 
them such as they have never experienced : not a famine of bread, 
nor a thirst for water, but of hearing the words of the Lord." 

Let the imagination have free play ; and can you conceive of 
a father inflicting a heavier doom ? Former visitations, darkness, 
dearth, pain, may be all in love : may be love's search after some 
way to reform the child, that he need not be turned out from under 
the paternal roof, a prodigal and a vagabond : may be the nauseat- 
ing draught to purge away death-bringing impurities : may be the 
surgeon's knife, cutting off the limb to save the life ; but this is no 
fatherly rod, nor remedial strain, or there might still be hope. It 
is the father's announcement, " I can do nothing else ; leave my 
house: you are no longer my son." It is the physician's cry, 
1 ' I am at the end of my skill ; mortification has seized the citadel : 
there is only death remains. " It is the decree of God, ' ' Ephraim 
is joined to his idols ; let him alone : call him, invite him, try 
him, no more ! " 

Let the imagination take its widest circuit ; and can you think 
of a darker day than the day when a famine of the Word of the 

227 



Lord begins ? — The day after which all communication is cut off 
between earth and heaven : and the Gospel folds up its parch- 
ment, and gives no message : and the Holy Spirit talks no more 
of the things of Christ ? — The day after which no angel comes in 
ministry of healing, and no church holds forth the lamp of life, 
and no Son of Man walks in the midst of the golden candlesticks ? 
There is no day fuller of woe this side of that day, the beginning 
of all woes, when the eternally unforgiven plunges that shoreless 
ocean whose billows are fire, and whose sands are the home of the 
undying worm which fattens on the spoils of wrecked immortality. 

O, carelessly as we allow our Bible to lie unopened, or hur- 
riedly as we scan its hallowed leaves, indolently as we hear or 
neglect the preaching of the Gospel, lightly as we miss or spurn 
the ordinances of the Sanctuary, the famine of the Word of the 
Lord is the sorest of all the possible ills of the house of our pil- 
grimage. David can be a fugitive, and be happy ; Jeremiah can 
be a prisoner, and be happy ; and Paul can be on the way to 
execution, and be happy ; but, shut out from converse with God, 
what life is worth living ? Examine every other resource : — 
dominion is a dungeon ; honor is a Tarpean rock, from which the 
descent is merely more fatal than from ordinary levels ; pleasure 
is the handmaid of pain ; and wealth is the pioneer of a poverty 
which is want indeed. Hunger must bring death ; and how can 
he but die who is without access to the Bread which cometh down 
from Heaven? Thirst is the pleading of the system for refresh- 
ment ; and how can He rally who can not find the Fountain 
digged on the brow of Calvary ? The word of the Lord is life ; 
and, without it, we are dead in sin and trespass, with no chance 
of resurrection. The Word of the Lord is truth ; and, without 
it, we are in chains and stocks : for only they are free whom the 
truth makes free. The Word of the Lord is the way ; and, with- 
out it, we are Cains and wanderers : for the way of man is not in 
himself. 

It is a judgment, severe as it is, with which both communities 
and individuals have been overtaken. Appealing to the records 

228 



of antiquity, behold the doom of Israel, the signally beloved of 
the Lord. It is His chosen child and minister — called apart from 
all other peoples into the radiance of His earliest and sweetest 
smiles. In all human history, never has any other nationality 
been folded so fondly to Jehovah's bosom — never has there been 
any other whose fortunes seemed to be so irreversible, whose 
mountain seemed to stand so strong, whose present seemed to be 
so prophetic of undying duration. Nevertheless, how changed 
the scene today : how the golden candlestick is departed, the 
glory faded, and the mighty fallen ! The Canaan for whose 
possession Abraham, Isaac and Jacob hoped so eagerly ; on which, 
from the outlook of Pisgah, the eye of Moses, as he was poising 
himself for passage to the Canaan above, looked so earnestly ; 
which flowed with honey and milk ; which held the Temple with 
all its hallowed furniture and mysteries ; which was the home of 
such eminent chieftains and poets and scholars and statesmen and 
saints ; which was the scene of the labors and studies of the 
prophets as they bare the burden of the Most High, revelled in 
the glowing landscapes of the future, and served as mouth-pieces 
of the Holy Spirit, testifying of the sufferings of Christ, and the 
glory which should follow ; which was the site where Immanuel 
manifested Himself in the fiesh, and set up His kingdom in the 
world, and threw open to every inhabitant of earth an highway to 
Heaven : — this Canaan is now laid low, over-run with debasing 
superstitions, and trodden in the dust by the heel of the oppressor. 
If we inquire for the churches established in the dawn of the 
Christian Dispensation, to our inquiry Echo answers, " Where? " 
" Where," asks Melville, " are those Christian societies to which 
St. Paul and St. John inscribed their epistles? Where is the 
Corinthian Church, so affectionately addressed, though so boldly 
reproved, by the great Apostle to the Gentiles? Where is the 
Philippian Church, where the Colossi an, where the Thessalonian, 
the letters to which prove how cordially Christianity had been re- 
ceived, and how vigorously it flourished ? Where are the Seven 
Churches of Asia, respecting which we are assured that they were 

229 



once strenuous in piety, and gave promise of permanence in 
Christian profession and privilege ? Alas, how true it is that the 
candlesticks have been removed ! Countries in which the Gospel 
was first planted, cities where it took earliest root, in these have 
all traces of Christianity long ago disappeared, and in these has 
the cross been supplanted by the crescent. The traveller through 
lands where apostles won their noblest victories, where martyrs 
witnessed a good confession, and thousands sprang eagerly forward 
to be baptized for the dead, and to fill up every breach which per- 
secution made in the Christian ranks, can scarce find a monument 
to assure him that he stands where once congregated the followers 
of Jesus. Everywhere he is surrounded 03^ superstitions little 
better than heathenism, so that the unchurching of these lands 
has been the giving them up to an Egyptian darkness. And these 
facts prove, with a clearness and awfulness of demonstration, 
which leave ignorance inexcusable, and indifference self-con- 
demned, that the blessings of Christianity are deposited with a 
nation to be valued and improved ; and that to despise or misuse 
them is to provoke their withdrawment. If we could trace the 
histories of the several churches to which we have referred, we 
should find they all ' left their first love,' grew lukewarm in re- 
ligion, or were daunted by danger into apostasy. There was no 
lack of warning, none of exhortation ; for it is never suddenly, 
never without a protracted struggle, that God proceeds to ex- 
tremes, whether with a church or an individual. But warning 
and exhortation were in vain. False teachers grew into favor ; 
false doctrines superseded the true ; with erroneous tenets came 
their general accompaniment, dissolute practice ; till at length, if 
the candlestick remained, the light was extinct ; and then God 
gave the sentence, that the candlestick should be removed out of 
its place." 

It has been with the individual as with the society. Adam, 
fresh from the hand of his Creator, was His bosom friend, the 
companion of His walks, as every evening He came down for a 
stroll with His creature among the bowers of Paradise. Every 

230 



delight and privilege lay waiting bis call. Now, he is an alien, 
driven from the garden, expelled from God, and prevented from 
return, with two-edged swords flashing in the hands of gleaming 
cherubim. A son of the illustrious David, the gifted and princely 
Solomon, was earth's kingliest, wisest citizen : his fame high as 
the skies and wide as the world , the favorite and pride of Jehovah 
among the sons of men. Now, he is earth's greatest fool, a blight 
on his bloom, an eclipse on his glory, the outcast of God, the scorn 
of men, the w r reck of all he was. The sun which rose in such un- 
wonted brilliance sinks in unwonted darkness ; and Scripture nar- 
rative leaves in stunning uncertainty the end of him whose morn- 
ing flung out such splendid promise of a cloudless day and a radi- 
ant night. Judas was chosen as an attendant of the Lord of life, 
favored with the fullest opportunities and teachings of his time, 
and meant to be one of the stones of the foundation of the Messianic 
empire. But earth's meagre pottage bribes him from his fidelity, 
the fiend chokes the man, and the wretch who has enjoyed par- 
ticular access to the presence of his Master and Saviour avails him- 
self of his freedom of approach to betray that Master and Saviour, 
covers his infamy with the salutation of affection, crowns his 
treachery with the kiss of friendship, and steals the raiment of 
love to hide the doing of a deed so dark and hellish that darkness 
has never contrived a darker, or hell joyed in one more hellish. 
There, gibbeted on the highest reach of sin and shame, standing 
in the pillory of all ages and eternities, the wTetch, who once had 
so grand an eminence and outlook as the disciple of Christ, but 
fell from his lofty estate, rushing with his own hand out of the life 
he had cursed and stained with his contact, and sinking into a 
tomb b\- the side of which common murderers and traitors would 
loathe to lie, warns all who have put on Christ to stand fast in the 
liberty wherewith Christ hath made them free, and to watch that 
they lose not His Word out of their hearts. 

Like causes produce like effects : and the judgment w T hich 
has fallen may fall again. As already observed, neither with the 
community nor with the person, is the descent from the approval 

231 



of God into His disapproval with one, sudden, voluntary spring. 
Apparently it may be so, but in fact it is gradual. In the lapse 
of Jewish faith and favor, Jewish history discovers to us the ad- 
vancing steps, the dreadful degeneracy, the increasing progress of 
the fatal poison, the widening prevalence of the virulent corrup- 
tion. In the lapse of the churches established by the labors of 
the apostles, evidently, there was first the failing away, and then 
the falling down. In the lapse of the individuals mentioned, 
there was the same sloping apostasy — disbelief of His Word, dis- 
regard of His claims, forgetfulness of His goodness, indifference 
to His ordinances, rebellion against His supremacy, and the 
struggle of self-wall for the throne. 

Centuries, in their onward flow, have not changed the fallen 
human heart. It is still an evil heart of pride and unbelief. It 
still would dethrone the Lord of all, and have its own way. It 
still would save itself, or stay unsaved. Centuries have not, more- 
over, changed the character or government of God, or His plan 
for human reconciliation to Himself. He is God over all, holy 
in all His ways, and righteous in all His works ; and only he can 
come again into His favor who comes completely under His rule : 
for Christianity builds itself on the death of all godless feeling in 
him who would ascend into its beatitudes, and demands the grave 
of self for the working out of its proposals in his behalf. Nor 
have centuries changed the possibility of the new man in Christ 
falling back into the old man of the flesh he was. The Word of 
God is the bread and meat with which the new life is maintained ; 
and if, because of his neglect of this Word, God visits him with 
its removal, famine of the staff of everlasting life clutches him in 
its grasp, and he must starve to death. 

It is possible that what has been may be again : what has 
happened others may happen us. The heavens may once more 
grow black, their windows shut, and wide-spread drought lock all 
the land in barrenness of the oracles of God ; or spiritual famine 
lay waste the individual soul, and leave the soul, now blooming 
with fragrant flowers and rich with goodly fruits, sterile as a stone. 

232 



It requires no prophetic eye to foresee the conditions which 
may again and against us constrain the decree spoken through the 
lips of Amos, and written in the words which we are now study- 
ing together. It is even now aiming its curses at the congrega- 
tion which is a mere mass of formalism, or profession, or worldli- 
ness — content with its appointments and name and standing, 
gathering no increase of the mind of Christ, and winning none to 
the knowledge of the truth. It is even now hurling its shafts at 
the individual who is cold or indifferent or indolent in the pursuit 
of eternal interests — careless of his covenant as he assumed the 
vows of God, ■" Here. Lord, I give myself to Thee ;" forgetful 
of his oft-repeated averment, " Though all men should deny Thee, 
yet will not I ;" hanging like a dead weight on the church unfor- 
tunate enough to have its register burdened with his worthless 
name ; making the way of truth to be evil spoken of, because he 
is one of its nominal travellers ; and treasuring up to himself 
wrath against the day of wrath by his inaction or unbelief. It is 
even now striking at the land w T hose business acknowledges no 
Decalogue, whose education brings in no claim or knowledge of 
Christ, whose law gives no heed to the higher law, whose politics 
pays no tribute to the rule of God, and whose religion takes the 
other way from the Sermon on the Mount. 

It is a possibility the remotest shadow of which should chill 
us to the very core of our being, and drive us to the constant, 
tireless care of every bud of grace left within our souls — catching 
for it every drop of dew, giving it due exposure to the sun, and 
hedging it tenderly from every frost. 

It is not too arduous a toil, or vigilance, to escape a famine of 
the Truth ; for there is no famine so much to be dreaded — none 
which can work a disaster so appalling and far-reaching. Better 
far that barrenness should benumb the soil, and desolation breathe 
its blast upon city and village far and wide. Better far that the 
fountain should never babble, and the rain never fall, and the sun 
never shine. Better far that the grain should never grow, and the 
orchard never hand down its fruit, and the pasture never pay its 

233 



tax. Better, far better, all this, than that God should hide His 
face, and hush His voice, and withdraw His Gospel. Better, far 
better, a famine of bread, and a thirst for water, than that there 
should be a famine of the Word of the Lord, and an eclipse of the 
Sun of Righteousness ; for, it earthly dearth should cut us off 
from life here, it would merely be letting us in to the heavenly 
fruit of the life hereafter ; and ' ' what is a man profited if he shall 
gain the whole world, and lose his own soul ? ' ' 

It must not be imagined, either, that a famine of the Word of 
the Lord might happen, and there happen nothing but the silence 
of the communications of God to man, and the suspension of the 
forces and institutions of the Gospel. It means infinitely more. 
It means a famine of the most precious of our possessions in other 
directions. It means that business decays, because confidence is 
gone of man in man ; and that charity dies, because Christianity 
is no longer its inspiration ; and that education fails, because the 
Gospel is no more its patron ; and that government is impossible, 
because religion is absent with its sanctions ; and that home is a 
mere memory of the past, because the Holy Scriptures light not up 
its altars and purify not its loves ; and that society- is an uproar, 
because the Word of the Lord has taken away its repressive and 
uplifting hand. "It means," says Melville, "that God must 
frown on the land from which He hath been provoked to withdraw 
His Gospel ; and that, if the frown of the Almighty rests on 
a country, the sun of that country's greatness goes rapidly down, 
and the dreariness of a moral midnight fast gathers above and 
around it. Has it not been thus with countries, and with cities, 
to which we have already referred, and from which, on account of 
their iniquities and impieties, the candlestick has been removed ? 
The Seven Churches of Asia, where are the cities whence they 
drew their names : cities that teemed with inhabitants, that were 
renowned for arts, and which served as centers of civilization to 
far-spreading districts ? Did the unchurching of these cities leave 
them their majesty and prosperity ? Did the removal of the 
candlestick leave undimmed their political lustre ? Ask the 

234 



traveller over prostrate columns, and beneath crumbling arches, 
having no index but ruins to tell him that a kingdom's dust is 
under his feet ; and endeavoring to assure himself, from the very- 
magnitude of the desolation, that he has found the site of a once 
splendid metropolis. The cities, with scarce an exception, wasted 
from the day when the candlestick was removed, and grew into 
monuments — monuments whose marble is decay, and whose 
inscriptions are devastations — telling out to all succeeding ages, 
that the readiest mode in which a nation can destroy itself, is to 
despise the Gospel with which it has been intrusted ; and that the 
most fearful vial which God can empty on a land, is that which 
extinguishes the shinings of Christianity." 

It is reason for which we should laud and magnify the name 
of Him Whose mercy endureth for ever, that the blight has not 
entirely fallen, and the decree has not yet gone forth which irrev- 
ocably seals our ruin. The flash of concern which kindles at our 
hearts on the mere mention of such a calamity as possible, dis- 
closes some heed for the continuance of the Gospel and its ordi- 
nances — some idea that its loss would be the most hurtful of all 
losses : some persuasion that we had better abandon all other 
commerce than stop off our commerce with the skies. There is 
no cry of Amos in our ears, declaring that the day of grace is 
over, " Behold, the days come, saith the Lord God, that I will 
send a famine in the land, not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for 
water, but of hearing the Word of the Lord : ' ' but the cry of the 
Son of God, ' ' To him that overcometh will I give to eat of the 
hidden manna, and I will give him a white stone, and in the stone 
a new name written, which no man knoweth saving he that re- 
ceiveth it. ' ' There is not yet at our door the grasp of need, but 
the horn of plenty — plenty of the meat which endureth to ever- 
lasting life. Let us eat that which is good, and let our souls 
delight in fatness. Let us bring all the tithes of service and 
worship into the storehouse, and prove the Lord of hosts, if He 
will not open the windows of Heaven even wider, and pour us out 
blessings, that there shall not be room enough to receive them. 

235 



It will be the end of danger of famine of the Word of the 
lyord, unless we shall again provoke Him. Giving Him the 
homage meet, dearth will be forgotten in fulness ; fields now too 
bare will gleam with harvests ; and garners, our churches and 
hearts, now too empty will be filled with richty-laden sheaves, 
from floor to roof. Prosperity will gladden every soul, growing 
for us out of the earth, and raining on us out of the sky. And 
we, with God for our Host, and seraphs for our waiters, will 
throng the mountain where is spread the promised feast of fat 
things full of marrow, of wines on the lees well refined ; and tune 
our voices to the song, set to music for the occasion, by Isaiah, 
" L,o, this is our God ; we have waited for Him, and He will save 
us : this is the Lord ; we have waited for Him, we will be glad 
and rejoice in His salvation." 



236 



XXV. 

' ! Verily, verily, I sa}' unto you, He that believeth on Me, the works 
that I do shall he do also ; and greater works than these shall he do ; be- 
cause I go unto My Father."— John, 14 : 12. 

A horror of great darkness is enfolding the little band of dis- 
ciples who, from the very beginning of His ministry, have forsaken 
all else to follow the Son of Man. All doubt is gone that He and 
they are soon to part company — He to die a death of pain and 
shame, and the}' to linger out lives of toil and trial. It is no 
marvel that their hearts are sad and sore as they realize His ap- 
proaching departure, and think of their own approaching desola- 
tion — children without a father, pilgrims without a guide, and 
soldiers without a leader. 

Christ is alread}^ standing within the shadow of His cross, 
and tasting all the bitterness of His cup of sorrow. His care, 
however, is not for Himself, but for them — wringing their hands 
in all the agonies and fears of orphanage. 

Longing to ease their load, and soothe their spirits, He cries, 
" X<et not your heart be troubled ; " and, with this counsel as His 
text, He assures them that faith in Him is faith in God ; declares 
that He is leaving them to prepare for them mansions in His 
Father's house ; and promises that, having made the requisite 
preparation, He will come and move them home. 

As they listen, and seek to accept their condition, they recol- 
lect how completely He has been their all in all. Hitherto, since 
espousing His cause, they have neither done nor planned for them- 
selves ; and yet they have lacked nothing. In Him, as fully as 
ever babe had in its mother all its desire and all its need, have they 
lived, and moved, and had their being. 

i: In Him they have been born into a better being : called into 
citizenship in the kingdom of Heaven, and lifted into partnership 
with God in the recovery of humanit3 r to primeval allegiance and 
blessedness. 

In assault He has been their defense, in darkness their light 

237 



and in want their sufficiency. In every extremity, whether of 
body or soul, whether of person or work, He has been their shield 
and sun and supply. 

In many instances He has borne loads for them which, in the 
employment of their natural powers, they might have borne for 
themselves if they had not come to count so generally and largely 
on Him, and if they had not found Him so uniformly gracious 
and strong. 

In many instances, however, they have been overtaken with 
emergencies where finite arms were not long enough, and where 
only Infinite arms could avail ; and where miracles have been 
needful, miracles have never been wanting. When hungry, He 
has brought them bread, without having to bake, or beg, or buy 
it. When needing money to pay their taxes, He has drawn on 
the mouth of a newly-caught fish, and found His draft immedi- 
ately honored. And when threatened with shipwreck, He has 
spoken the troubled waters into quietness. Verily, verily, in Him 
as has been their day has been their strength ; and nothing they 
could ask has ever been denied them. 

As they thus recollect the past, they anxiously strain their 
eyes into the future. Assuringly indeed He has bidden them to 
be of good cheer ; and declared that His impending departure is in 
their interest ; and promised that He will return, and take them 
to Himself for ever. But how shall they do in the mean time ? 
Accustomed to His company and counsel and provision, how shall 
they bear His absence ? Even though able, after a fashion, to 
earn their bread, and follow their calling, and hold fast their 
integrity, will life be worth living when He has ascended up on 
high? 

Even with Him by their side, ever and anon they have 
encountered emergencies when, without the exercise of His Om- 
nipotence, they would have been crushed by the onset ; and how 
shall they keep their feet, in similar subsequent emergencies, when 
He has gone back into the glory which He had with His Father 
before the world was ? 

238 



Having His commission to preach the Gospel of His King- 
dom, to proclaim Him as the Lord and Saviour of all men every- 
where, and to summons all the ends of the earth, under penalty 
of eternal death, to His acceptance and service and worship, how 
shall they meet the opposition their message will provoke when 
He has passed into the heavens ? 

How shall they breast the storms of scorn and wrath with 
which earth and hell shall pelt their defenceless heads for their 
audacity in lifting His banner as universal Redeemer and Sover- 
eign, when, crucified as a blasphemer and traitor, He has with- 
drawn the light of His countenance, and the wonders of His 
hand ? Ignorant, poor, and weak, — with neither arms nor influ- 
ence nor skill, — with what of heart or hope can they prosecute 
a mission in itself so heartless and hopeless ? Is it strange that, 
with such an outlook, they cry, "All these things are against 
us ;" or declare, "We are of all men the most miserable;" or 
wail, ' ' We had trusted that it had been He which should have 
redeemed Israel ?' ' 

As they peer thus dolefully into the future, He, reading their 
hearts, says, " He that believeth on Me, the works that I do shall 
he do also " — Belief in Me has, so far in your career, been your 
safety and success and sufficiency. A Babe of humble birth, a 
Man of sorrows, without place to lay My head, your faith appre- 
hended Me as the Consolation of Israel and Redemption of the 
race. Hated by the Church, and scorned by the world, your faith 
beheld Me as your individual Lord and Saviour. Led as a Lamb 
to the slaughter, your faith saw in Me " the Resurrection and the 
Life. ' ' Never has your faith been disappointed : according to 
yonr faith it has always been done unto you ; for either by natural 
or by supernatural means I have alw T ays wrought out your expec- 
tations. 

Continuing to believe in Me, your future shall be as your 
past. Faith in Me, not sense of My bodily presence, is the con- 
dition of your security and triumph, whether you see Me or not. 
You can not have forgotten how once, when you were with Me 

239 



in My own country, I could not do many mighty works because 
of the unbelief of My countrymen. You can not have forgotten 
how, once when I w^as with you in a ship, letting go your faith, 
you began sinking in the storm-swept sea ; and how, recovering 
your faith, you walked the sea as if it were solid ground. You 
can not have forgotten how the Syro-Phcenician woman, who 
forced her way through the cold and forbidding and scornful 
exterior I assumed, grasped My real self with her faith, and held 
on until she gained her suit, and won the healing of her daughter. 

" Faith, mighty faith, the promise sees, 
And looks to that alone : 
Laughs at impossibilities, 
And cries, It shall be done." 

I neither find fault, nor wonder, that, depending on Me these 
many months we have companied together, to clear away all your 
impediments, and to drive from the field all your oppositions, and 
to procure all your provisions, you are disconsolate at thought of 
my departure. But, "if ye have faith as a grain of mustard- 
seed, ye shall say unto this mountain, Remove hence to yonder 
place, and it shall remove ; and nothing shall be impossible unto 
you." Keep good heart : My departure is not in fact, but merely 
In form : M) T departure is not in My Divinity, but only in My 
humanity. 

My Divinity I leave in your hands, as near and ready and 
strong for your use as when you have seen Me lay it out through 
My humanity for your deliverance and supply. Onty believe on 
Me, and, as far as you need their repetition, ' ' the works that I do 
shall ye do also." Though you see Me not, yet believe on Me ; 
and you shall be as safe, and my kingdom, in your hands, shall be 
as strong as ever. 

Through your faith in Me, wielding all the prerogatives you 
have seen Me wield, you shall see wrought over all the works you 
have seen Me work. These signs shall follow 3'ou, believing on 
Me : — in My name shall you cast out devils ; you shall speak 
with new tongues ; you shall take up serpents ; if you drink any 

240 



deadly thing, it shall not hurt you ; you shall lay hands on the 
sick, and they shall recover ; and, marching on from conquest to 
conquest, you shall shout, " The Lord of hosts is with us : the 
God of Jacob is our refuge. ' ' 

As an additional encouragement, He adds, li And greater 
works than these shall ye do ; because I go unto My Father." 
At first reading, this saying is difficult of belief, or at least of 
comprehension. He is Divine, while they are human ; He has 
been accomplishing marvels, while they have been mere pensioners 
on His bounty, or taxes on His resources ; and it seems incredible 
that He shall decrease, while they increase ; or that He shall fall 
in impotence or insignificance, while they mount His sphere and 
soar into sublimer scenes and works. 

But He does not covenant that they shall be able to do 
greater works than He is able to do, but greater works than these 
which He has done ; for He has all power in earth and in 
Heaven. 

Neither does He covenant that they shall do works intrinsi- 
cally greater than the works He has done : for He has wrought 
miracles ; and no works they can do can be more than miracles. 

Neither does He covenant that they shall go beyond Him in 
the number of their works ; for the record does not reveal this : 
and, moreover, the record does not show all He did. " There are 
also many other things which Jesus did, the which, if they should 
be written every one, I suppose that even the world itself could 
not contain the books that should be written." 

Neither does He covenant that they shall outdo Him in the 
variety of their works ; for air and land and sea have felt and 
kissed His sceptre. Bodj r and mind and soul have hailed His 
benignity, and owned His dominance. Celestial beings have gone 
hither and thither at His command ; fallen spirits have given up 
their captives at His mandate ; and men and women and children, 
at His summons, have leaped back into health and life, from the 
very verge of the tomb. 

Neither does He covenant, or hint, that their works shall be 

241 



done independently of Him, or without full tribute to His 
supremacy and supervision and virtue. 

Upon the contrary, He covenants that their greater works 
shall be greater because of His going to His Father, and because 
His going to His Father shall open before them broader oppor- 
tunities, and secure for them richer resources. 

As we ponder this final clause of this teeming averment, the 
meaning of the entire averment grows clear. All the Godhead is 
concerned in the re-establishment of the Kingdom of God among 
men, and in the recover} 7 of the world from its rebellion and ruin. 
All Scripture, delineating the introduction of this Kingdom into 
the world, and its march to the inheritance of the uttermost parts 
of the earth, proclaims not only the interest of the Father, and the 
oblation of the Son, but also the outpouring of the Holy Spirit : 
and portrays the outpouring of the Holy Spirit as the period when 
the mightiest wonders of the "Economy of Grace" shall have 
their manifestation. 

But, according to Christ's own announcement, the Holy 
Spirit shall not come into the world in His special ministry until 
Christ's visible ministry is finished. " It is expedient for you that 
I go away : for, if I go not away, the Comforter will not come 
unto you ; but if I depart, I will send Him unto you." 

Declaring, " Greater works than I have done shall ye do*, 
because I go unto My Father," He declares that the dispensation 
of the Holy Spirit, the Divinely decreed dispensation of the ful- 
ness of the Gospel, is waiting on His session at the right hand of 
His Father, where He shall breathe His intercession, dispense 
supplies, receive the glory due unto His holy Name, watch the 
fortunes of His Church as it goes forth conquering and to con- 
quer, and welcome home eternally to His Father's house His fol- 
lowers, as one by one the}' pass from struggle to triumph. 

Doing — as I understand Him to say — My part by My doctrine 
and life and oblation, I have cleared the way for the establish- 
ment of the Kingdom of God in the world ; designated its methods 
and requirements ; and selected its heralds. I have laid the foun- 

242 



dation, and in so doing I have done many gTeat works ; but the 
time for the greater works which are to be done in the furtherance 
of My Kingdom in the world, and which are to lift My Kingdom 
above all opposing kingdoms, has not yet come. This time, in 
the ordination of Divinity, can not come while I am with you as 
I have hitherto been ; for the Divine Personality Whose office it 
is to dwell henceforth in the Church, and guide it into all truth, 
and invest it with its full powers, and lead it into its predestined 
victories, can not assume His office until I have gone back unto 
My Father. 

I, in order to His coming, under the charter of My Kingdom, 
have to return to the glory which I had with My Father before the 
world was ; for, under that charter, I have to carry on My w T ork 
there, while the Holy Spirit represents and succeeds Me here. 

I, passing up to My throne, will send the Holy Spirit. He 
also is Divine, being one with My Father and Myself, very God 
of very God ; and you will therefore be in the hands of no inferior 
Agent or Counsellor. He will be to you and with you all I have 
been. Though you shall not see Him as you have seen Me, you 
shall be as sensible of His presence and sufficiency as you have 
been of Mine. 

I on the throne, caring for } r ou, and He within you, keeping 
you, you shall enter into the broader opportunities the future shall 
develop, and work those greater works which shall be possible 
through those greater opportunities, and through which My 
banners shall be borne from conquest to conquest until the end 
come — until all the ends of the earth shall see the salvation of 
God : until on the foundation I have laid, the whole stupendous 
edifice shall be crowned with its capstone, and ' ' ye are no more 
strangers and foreigners, but fellow- citizens with the saints, and 
of the household of God ; and are built upon the foundation of 
the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ Himself being the chief 
corner-stone, in Whom all the building, fitly framed together, 
groweth unto an holy temple in the I,ord : in Whom ye also are 
builded together for an habitation of God through the Spirit." 

243 



The inspiring announcement made by the departing Saviour 
in the ears of His stricken disciples, is no friendly fraud to recon- 
cile them to their loss until He has escaped their grief ; but it is 
the declaration of the great law of His Kingdom, that men are the 
agents in its advancement and consummation, while He all the while 
is their direction and encouragement and potency ; and the expres- 
sion of the great truth that men, availing themselves of His Holy 
Spirit, as His Kingdom moves forward to universal supremacy, 
shall see still greater marvels than the marvels amid which it was 
set up in the world — greater, because born of better conditions ; 
greater, because growing into fuller fruitage ; greater, because 
moving mightier multitudes ; greater, because reaching wider 
realms ; and greater, because witnessing with enlarging emphasis, 
as time hastens into eternity, that Jesus Christ is the same yester- 
day, and today, and for ever. 

Christ's forecast nearly twenty centuries ago is history now. 
Ascending incarnate into the heavens, and investing Himself 
with the government of His Church from His own eternal throne, 
He has not forgotten His covenant with His disciples. As they 
wait in prayer, after their return from the Mount of His Ascen- 
sion, suddenly there comes from Heaven a sound as of a rushing, 
mighty wind, filling all the house of their assembly ; and cloven 
tongues like as of fire flame upon their heads ; and their hearts 
glow with the Holy Spirit ; and their tongues speak languages 
they had never learned ; and they, Divinely and instantaneously 
taught, tell the story of their crucified and risen Lord to the 
multitudes of foreigners thronging Jerusalem in their own vernac- 
ular — doing a greater work than Christ, Whose ministry had 
mainly been confined to His own countrymen. 

As they lay themselves out in labor and prayer and study, 
they exhibit larger conceptions of the Kingdom of God, and 
larger experiences of its preciousness, and larger views of its 
potency, than Christ had affected within them ; for to His very 
death they were blind and dumb and slow to comprehend His 
mission. 

244 



As they grow in grace and knowledge, they reveal mightier 
belief and courage and love and patience and zeal than Christ had 
wrought within them ; for hitherto they had shown little of those 
graces and virtues. 

As they pursue their ministry, they bring thousands to Christ, 
where He had gathered only a few scattered followers ; and while 
His ministry was mainly in Judea, they, beginning in Jerusalem, 
go with the story of Jesus and the Resurrection to the uttermost 
parts of the known earth — working over His works, and working 
greater works in their farther journeys and richer opportunities 
and resources. 

Neither does the Apostolic age exhaust the fruitfulness of the 
covenant of which it had the first inheritance. As they who first 
proved the covenant true to its smallest iota finish their ministry, 
crowding successors catch their falling mantles, and imbibe a 
double portion of their spirit, and sweep even a larger circuit ; 
for what are the few material marvels wrought in the dawn of the 
Christian Dispensation, in comparison with the spiritual marvels 
wrought later in its day ? 

Bidding His disciples good-bye on Olivet, and leaving Olivet 
for the skies, Christ had not a follower outside of Judea : but 
before His disciples followed Him up the celestial highway, He 
had a following in Antioch and Athens and Corinth and Ephesus 
and Galatia and Rome. 

Ceasing their labors, and going up to their recompense, His 
disciples could not exult over one country where Christ had suprem- 
acy in its institutions or laws or worship : but today there is not 
a country of any consideration among all the countries of the 
world, in which Christ's Name is not above every name. 

" He that believeth on Me, the works that I do shall he do 
also ; and greater works than these shall he do," is the covenant 
of Christ, God over all, blessed for ever more, the Head of the 
Christian Church : and the history of the Church is ablaze with 
demonstrations that, as she has believed on Him, emphasizing 
belief with corresponding exercise of Divine endowment, she has 

245 



worked moral wonders. Moreover, here and there, along her 
path, from its humble beginning at the birth of Christ, with her 
handful of members, without church or college or infirmary or 
patronage, to this hour when her churches dot every continent, 
and her colleges light every land, and her infirmaries open every- 
where to the helpless, and her patronage summons to success, 
there have been periods when her power was overwhelming — 
periods when entire communities were aflame with revival, and 
multitudes, breaking away from materialism and sin and unbelief, 
sought the redemption which hallows her altars : periods which 
show there is no moral wonder she may not work when full of 
faith and of the Holy Ghost. 

Alas, that she so often fails of her heritage, and hides her 
light ! Alas, that she so often wastes her strength and time in 
fixing up her camps, when she ought to be putting in her strength 
and time in forcing her columns forward to the conquest of the 
world ! Alas, that with Almightiness in her hands, she leans so 
largely on carnal methods, and lingers so cravenly for carnal sup- 
ports ! Alas, that having developed all there is of modern civil- 
ization — all there is of its art and charity and commerce and elo- 
quence and law and music and science — , she seeks so largely to 
win in their name, rather than in the faithfulness and prayer with 
which she has won all she has ever won. 

Brethren, we have a right to capture all we can for Christ, 
whether in art or charity or commerce or eloquence or law or 
music or science ; and we have a right to turn all the arms and 
stores we capture against the enemies from whom we take them : 
but is it loyal or manly or wise to hoist their banners, or shoot 
their guns, or use their tactics, instead of those with which we 
have driven them from the field ? 

1 ' He that believeth on Me, the works that I do shall he do 
also ; and greater works than these shall he do," is the announce- 
ment of the Captain of our salvation. *' Not by might, nor by 
power, but by My Spirit, saith the Lord." " The Spirit helpeth 
our infirmities." " We can do all things, through Christ Which 

246 



strengtheneth us : ' ' ' ' strengthened with might by His Spirit in 
the inner man." M Ye shall receive power, after that the Holy 
Ghost is come upon you. " 

I insist that Christ means His announcement to be taken lit- 
erally, and that the announcement is for all the ages of the 
Christian Dispensation. I insist that He worked all the works 
possible to Him in His life here in the flesh — He being limited by 
the " Economy of Grace " to the laying of the foundation of the 
Kingdom of God in the world ; and that in the ' ' Economy of 
Grace ' ' it was not possible to Him to carry visibly the enterprise 
to its consummation ; and that in the ' ' Economy of Grace ' ' the 
Church He organized is to work those greater works which are to win 
Him universal faith and universal fealty. I insist that the essential 
endowment of power is not the exhausted heritage of the earlier 
days of the Church, and that the Spirit of power is not a mere 
legacy or memory of the past. I insist that Christ, our Lord and 
Redeemer, as well as the L,ord and Redeemer of the saints of 
former times, is waiting on our disinthralment from our indiffer- 
ence and worldliness and unbelief, and on our outlay of our 
possible power, to work the Divinely decreed greater works which 
are to usher in the end, when the jubilant and victorious hosts of 
Redemption — laying down their arms, and waving their banners, 
— shall sing the song of the elders before the throne of God , ' ' We 
give Thee thanks, O Lord God Almighty, Which art, and wast, 
and art to come, because Thou hast taken to Thee Thy great 
power, and hast reigned." 

To him that believeth, all things are possible. To us, as 
well as to the original disciples, is given the assurance that, 
believing on the Son of God, and employing our sublimer chances, 
we shall work greater works than those with which He inaugu- 
rated His Kingdom among men. To us, as well as to those before 
us in Christian faith and life, He calls, " He that believeth on Me, 
the works that I do shall he do also ; and greater works than 
these shall he do ; because I go unto my Father " — to open 
before you broader doors, and to send you the Holy Spirit as rein- 

247 



forcement. With His direction and help, you shall outdo all I 
have done. I accomplished the beginning ; but you shall bring 
in the consummation. I began the campaign ; but you shall 
carry the standard to the conquest. I did marvels which ended 
in their doing ; but you shall do marvels which shall multiply 
themselves into countless other marvels. I effected cures which 
kept death at bay for a little season ; but you shall effect cures 
after which there shall be no more death. I fed thousands with 
the bread which perisheth ; but you shall feed thousands of 
thousands with the bread which endureth unto everlasting life. 
I gathered a few out of their graves who had to go back into their 
graves again and wait the general resurrection ; but you shall 
gather myriads out of deeper graves, to go back into their graves 
never more. I healed bodies ; but you shall heal souls. I had 
the first-fruits ; but you shall reap the harvest. I lighted up a 
little corner of humanity ; but you shall light up its entire 
breadth and depth and length. I lifted the dawn upon the world- 
wide night ; but you shall sun the night into the morning which 

" high and higher shines, 
To pure and perfect day." 

I touched earth with a halo of Heaven ; but you shall turn earth 
into Heaven, and wake both into the glad acclaim, "The 
kingdoms of the world are become the kingdoms of our IyOrd, and 
of His Christ ; and He shall reign for ever and ever." 

" I'll make your great commission known ; 

And ye shall prove My Gospel true, 
By all the works that I have done, 

By all the wonders ye shall do." 



248 



XXVI. 

[A National Centennial Sermon, Preached in Grace Methodist Episcopal Church, 
Harrisburg, Pa., Sabbath morning, July 2, 1876.] 

1 ■ And they took of the fruit of the land in their hands, and brought it 
down unto us, and brought us word again, and said, It is a good land which 
the Lord our God doth give us."— Deuteronomy, 1:25. 

I do not address Infidelity in any of its modes or forms 
during the exercises of the present hour. I take no account of 
the man who, ignoring Divine connection with material exist- 
ences, asserts that the world sprung up spontaneously, or was the 
product of Chance, or the result of a fortuitous combination of 
atoms ; or who, admitting that Jehovah fashioned it, maintains 
that He has nothing farther to do with it, exercising over it no 
supervision, and that all follows unerringly and imperatively some 
original impulse. 

I talk to Christian citizens, who receive the Bible as a Reve- 
lation from Heaven ; who believe in a Special Providence ; and 
who confess the existence of a Deity above, whose moral govern- 
ment comprises the Universe within the circle of its influence. 

This Divine Being is the Author and Conservator of all life. 
Individual existences are in obedience to His Word. Nations rise 
and flourish in the ordination, and by the permission, of His 
Providence. 

But all things are to Him, as well as of Him and through 
Him. It is the chief end of the individual to glorify Him in body 
and spirit. And a nation is organized to accomplish His pur- 
poses, and to make known his glorious Name throughout the 
earth. 

Amid the surroundings of adversity, to Him are owed con- 
fession and deprecation. When the path of an individual is over- 
hung with calamities, and his heart is stricken with misfortunes, 
the individual ought to humble himself before the Almighty and 
bewail his transgressions and shortcomings. And when a nation 
is overtaken with judgments, and the waves of ruin are threaten- 
ing its speedy engulf ment, the nation ought to go into mourning 

249 



and, amid sackcloth and ashes, look humbly up to Him Who 
ruleth over all : beseeching the removal of His wrath, and the 
shining forth of His face again. 

Amid the surroundings of prosperity, to Him is due a grate- 
ful acknowledgment. If the individual is happy, he ought to 
take the cup of thanksgiving in his hand, and pay his vows unto 
the Lord in the presence of all the people, saying, " What shall I 
render unto the Lord for all His benefits ?' ' And if the nation is 
gifted with a goodly heritage, the nation's voice ought to be heard 
sounding forth in tones of unmistakable emphasis the tribute of 
praise, crying, " Not unto us, O Lord, not unto us, but unto Thy 
Name give glory, for Thy mercy, and for Thy truth's sake !" 

In recognition of these truths are held the exercises of this 
Sabbath. The United States are just closing the first century of 
their independent existence. Throughout the length and the 
breadth of the land is heard the sound of the Jubilee. The air is 
bright with banners and vocal with song. Christianity wants a 
share in the general rejoicing. Purely secular feelings must not 
rule the hour. Patriotism may swing its hat, but Piety must have 
its shout. 

The briefest examination of our National history indicates 
our possession of a goodly heritage. The scene of our National 
existence is admirably adapted to assist its occupants to greatness 
and prosperity. Looking at the lands constituting our inheritance, 
who will presume to dispute that the lines have fallen unto us in 
pleasant places ? The climate is healthy ; the soil is capable of 
varied productions ; the forests and mines contain abundant 
material for the creation of mechanical and mineral wealth ; the 
waters furnish means of irrigation and conveyance ; and, in addi- 
tion to the internal streams which serve as channels of communi- 
cation and commerce, old Ocean rolls its billows all around our 
shores as a rampart against foreign aggression, and spreads its 
waves to carry our merchandise. 

The elements entering into our Nationality, distinguishing us 
from all other peoples, are peculiarly conducive to the formation 

250 



of as perfect a race as is possible to depraved humanity arnid its 
present surroundings. The American people is not the growth, 
or remainder, or result, of any one stock ; but all the leading 
races of the world have contributed their excellence to produce an 
appropriate ownership for this magnificent heritage. What is 
valuable in the English, Irish, Scotch, German and French, has 
been mixed into the American, and bestows on him his transparent 
matchlessness of head and heart and limb. 

The circumstances lining our National path have combined 
to facilitate our development and progress. Health has been our 
general portion ; plenty has characterized our seasons ; immunity 
from foreign invasion has been signally our lot ; exemption from 
internal dissension, to an unusual degree, has been our privilege ; 
minerals have been discovered when and where they were needed ; 
new grains and vegetables and flowers and fruits have been sug- 
gested cS we have been ready to cultivate them ; inventions have 
come to light in equal pace with our necessities ; literary oppor- 
tunities have reached themselves out as they have been demanded 
for intellectual improvement ; political institutions have been or- 
dained aid extended as we were raised to their appreciation, and 
were prepared for their enjoyment ; and religion has constantly 
proffered her gentle and supporting and elevating and enriching 
and ennoWing ministries to guide, and help, and comfort, and 
save, all ^ho— turning from improper courses, and subordinating 
the earthlj to the heavenly, — would lean on her arm and nestle 
in her boson. 

We hare received this goodly heritage from God. He is the 
Donor of al the blessings and immunities with which, as a Na- 
tion, we an so signally enriched and distinguished. To this 
proposition there is not universal assent — at least not universal 
practical assert. Some are so base or blind that they will posi- 
tively and dinctly deny it. Others will lose sight of the Divine 
authorship of their mercies, in the secondary causes which are 
merely the vehicles of their transportation. Still, to Jehovah, 



251 



the God of the whole earth, is the Nation indebted for all it has 
that is precious or excellent. 

His hand fitted up this western world for the scene of our 
existence — spreading its plains, lifting its hills, locating its waters, 
arranging its climate, fertilizing its soil, planting its forests, 
and embedding its minerals. His hand folded around it the 
mantle of darkness which for so many centuries withheld it from 
the vision and grasp of other portions of the world, and so 
preserved it in its virgin loveliness for our occupancy. And His 
hand finally raised the cloud, discovered its existence, put it into 
the temporary ownership of powers most competent to be our 
forerunners, and then led us over to its possession and lordship. 

He formed the people whose intelligence and energy have 
made such skilful use of the resources placed in its hands. He 
ordered its constituency — bringing here the English, with their 
force ; and the Irish, with their generosity ; and the Scotch, with 
their will ; and the German, with their perseverance ; aid the 
French, with their vivacity ; and blending them into the race 
qualified to accomplish the wonderful destiny which is evidently 
intended to be wrought out in these latter days upon this nagnifi- 
cent theatre. 

His Providence environed us with the propitious circum- 
stances which have attended and illumined our progress. Through 
its interposition has health been breathed on our persors, plenty 
dropped on our fields, and prosperity conveyed to our <ommuni- 
ties. It has been our shield from foreign injuries, and our 
preservation from internal distractions. Its finger hasdeveloped 
our minerals, indicated new varieties for cultivation, and led the 
way to the inventions that are, every day, leaving the Past so far 
in the rear of the Present. Its wand, waved with more than 
magical influence, has called up the educational, c^led out the 
political, and called down the religious, advantages tHat, properly 
improved, have such marvellous potency to effect th< redemption 
and perfection of humanity. 

Verily, the Lord hath not dealt so with any 4ther people. 

252 



He hath exalted us to Heaven in the way of endowment and 
privilege. An hundred years ago, a handful of corn was dropped 
on the earth upon the top of a mountain. So insignificant was 
the commencement of the American Nation — a mere handful of 
corn. Its circumstances were as unfavorable to development, and 
as uncongenial, as is the summit of a mountain to the growth of 
corn in comparison with the milder and more fertile plain at its 
base. But, as the hundred years terminate, what results salute 
our vision and thrill our hearts ! Its fruits shake like Lebanon. 
Its ears are so numerous and lofty and crowded with grain that, 
when shaken by the wind, they sound like the cedars of Lebanon 
when breathed on by the passing blast. 

How manifest is the right of our beloved Methodism to a 
share in this National Centennial celebration ! Our Church has 
always been loyal. In the Revolutionary war, Wesley took sides 
with the Colonies, addressing Lord North and the Earl of Dart- 
mouth in their behalf. At her organization, in 1784, the Church 
inserted in her Articles of Religion a recognition of the new gov- 
ernment, and was the first religious body in the land to make 
patriotism a test of membership with communicants. In 1804, 
her General Conference, alarmed at the disposition to rate State 
above Federal authority — as indicated in the Kentucky Resolu- 
tions of "98," and the Virginia Resolutions of "99 " — solemnly 
declared the United States to be "a sovereign and independent 
Nation." On the election of Washington to the Presidency, she 
aroused some ill-feeling in some other denominations because she 
first sent her highest officers to congratulate the illustrious 
patriot, and to promise him her support. From her earliest period 
she has steadily asked what could be done for the extirpation of 
Slavery ; and during the recent contest between Slavery and Free- 
dom, according to Mr. Lincoln, she outranked any other in behalf 
of Freedom, in the soldiers she sent to the field, the nurses she 
sent to the hospitals, and the prayers she sent to Heaven. All 
her periodicals were openly, steadily on the side of the Govern- 



253 



ment ; and few indeed were the pulpits under her control that did 
not preach loyalty as essential to piety. 

And now our Centenary Year has come. We stand on the 
threshold. The voice of rejoicing fills the land. The great 
results we celebrate this morning were wrought by human instru- 
mentality. Let the instruments have their meed of praise. Bright 
be the memory of the statesmen and captains, of the soldiers and 
sailors, of the husbandmen and mechanics, of the divines and 
scholars, of the lawyers and doctors, of the men and women and 
children, who have done their part in public and in private. 

But human instrumentality has been made efficient by Divine 
blessing. Except the Lord build the city, they labor in vain who 
build. 

Let us render appropriate thanksgiving to the Most High. 
While we shout hurrahs, and shoot guns, and fling banners to the 
breeze, let us not forget to compass the altars of the Lord of hosts, 
and to utter grateful tribute in His ears. 

Let us properly estimate the responsibilities that connect our- 
selves with the triumph and heritage upon which, at this auspi- 
cious hour, we congratulate each other. Supplicating the guidance 
and help of Him through Whom all our previous progress has 
been made, and all our previous conquests have been won, let us 
go forth to meet all obligations to ourselves, to our fellow-citizens, 
to our Nation, and to the world. We need not blush to hold up 
our heads. We belong to no scrubby race. The nobles of the 
the world are our fathers. 

" Our vows, our prayers, we now present 

Before Thy throne of grace : 
God of our fathers, be the God 

Of their succeeding race." 

Good-bye, first century of my country's life ! Many treasures 
hast thou carried into our lap. Untold honors hast thou bound 
about our brow. Unnumbered benedictions hast thou laid upon 
our heart. Never shalt thou fade from our memory. " If I for- 
get thee, O Jerusalem, let my right hand forget her cunning. If 

254 



I do not remember thee, let my tongue cleave to the roof of my 
mouth." 

Hail, thou new century ! Under God, in the name of the 
Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, we give our Na- 
tion to thy bosom. Bear her to deeper peace, richer prosperity, 
grander renown, and loftier righteousness. Make her increasingly 
the praise of earth and the joy of Heaven. 

And thou, dear old flag, still ride the land, and span the seas, 
and fill the air ! Still stay the pride of the free, and the hope of 
the struggling. Link thy folds with the folds of the flag of the 
Cross. Float for God as well as man. Give thyself anew to the 
breeze. And, ere the entering century shall depart, take the world 
for Liberty and Christ ! 



255 



XXVII. 

" Man giveth up the ghost, and where is he? " — Job, 14 : 10. 

"We are confident, I say, and willing rather to be absent from the 
body, and to be present with the Lord."— II. Corinthians, 5 : 8. 

I often think of many, who have long been out of my sight, 
to whom I used to sustain very intimate relations : — boys with 
whom I played in the days of my childhood ; companions at 
school ; associates in the ministry ; members of congregations to 
which I have preached ; people whose hospitality I have enjoyed ; 
the parents who guarded my infancy, and trained me into man- 
hood ; the brother and sister who shared the gladness of my 
youth ; the little one who first called me " Papa," and who was, 
in his infancy, taken from the home on earth to the home above ; 
the wife of my heart and life who, after sharing all my experi- 
ences on earth for well-nigh forty years, followed that first of our 
children into that last glad home ; and the daughter who, having 
grown to womanhood, quickly followed her mother, to make one 
more in that part of my own family which has moved beyond the 
stars. 

But they never enter my presence now. No path ever leads 
me into their company. No sunshine ever reveals their forms. 
No breeze ever bears their voices into my ears. They have 
dropped from among the living. Earth is no longer their home, 
only as its bosom hides their dust and my heart holds their memory. 

And their doom is the doom of the entire race. There hast- 
ens toward every one of us the period when we shall have fallen 
from the paths with which we are so familiar, and shall have 
vacated the circles in which we have so long revolved. The living 
must go down among the dead, and be overtaken with all the 
mysterious descent implies. Every human being shall give up 
the ghost — surrender the vital principle which animates his frame 
and constitutes him a distinct moral personality. 

Under these circumstances, — bewailing our departed darlings, 

256 



and standing ourselves in the shadow of death, — how naturally 
we inquire, Where are they? Where is man, when he has given 
up the ghost ? 

Where is his body ? This is not the man ; but it is that 
through which he is perceptible and tangible. Corning from the 
earth, it has gone back to the earth. The immaterial principle 
withdrawn, it speedily resolves into the dust from whence it arose 
into its finer, fairer form. There is, however, no destruction of 
its particles. After its dissolution, there is as much matter in the 
universe as before. But it is constantly passing into other shapes 
of being, until finally no trace remains of the configuration 
deposited in the grave. Friendship may care for the grave ever 
so fondly : enclose it with the strongest of masonry, shade it with 
the fairest of trees, adorn it with the sweetest of flowers, and 
watch it with the kindliest of eyes ; but there is no arrest of the 
decomposition going on within. " Earth to earth, ashes to ashes, 
dust to dust, ' ' is its destiny. Laid down by the soul, the discarded 
body, as has been well said by another, "flows away in atoms, 
first the lighter, then the grosser, along that swift, changeful, 
interweaving current of matter which girdles the whole world, and 
is put to all manner of unexpected uses, and submits to millions 
of unforeseen appropriations. ' ' 

" Hark ! from the tombs a doleful sound : 
My ears attend the cry : 
Ye living men, come, view the ground, 
Where you must shortly lie." 

Where is His Spirit? This is really the man. The body 
is only his tenement, his temporary residence, the window through 
which he looks out, the organ on which he plays, the agent of his 
will. The spirit is no material organism. It shares not in the 
overthrow of its habitation. It moves safely and sublimely forth, 
a deathless essence. Nor, as some suggest, in the great crisis, 
does it lose its individuality in the Divine Being. It is not simply 
blended with the Source from which it originally emerged. It 
maintains its identity. It retains all its primal completeness and 

257 



separateness. Neither, as some insist, does it pass into a condi- 
tion of unconsciousness, awaiting the summons to revivification. 
There is no suspension of its faculties and forces. It survives, 
undestroyed and unimpaired, the shock which brings the body to 
the ground. Through all the surrounding ruin, it is as replete 
with life, and all its endowments, as ever in all its previous his- 
tory. " We certainly," says Drew, "have less reason to believe 
that death will terminate our existence, than we have to conclude 
that it will only change the manner of our being. Around and 
within us there are intimations in this direction which, in their 
combined effects, amount to the highest degree of moral certainty, 
if not to a positive demonstration of the fact. And, to admit the 
human soul to be immortal, is to grant a state of consciousness 
beyond the grave." 

Such was the assumption of philosophical Paganism. Phae- 
don inquires, " How shall we bury you, Socrates?" And Socra- 
tes replies, "Just as you please, if you can catch me ;" and then, 
with a smile, he adds, ' ' I can not convince Phaedon that the mind 
conversing with him is myself : but he thinks me to be the corpse 
he will soon see laid out, and asks how he will bury me. " Cicero 
declares the arguments of Socrates in favor of the immortality of 
the soul are conclusive to him : and affirms, M The nearer I ap- 
proach to death, I seem to be getting sight of land, and, after a 
long voyage, to be just coming into harbor." Cyrus, on his death- 
bed, says, " Never imagine, O dearest sons, that I have ceased to 
be, when I have departed from you. Believe that I still exist, 
though you will see nothing of me. ' ' Such was the faith of the 
early advocates of the Christian religion. Clement, first Bishop 
of Rome, says, "All generations, from Adam to this day, are 
past and gone, and possess the region of the godly." Polycarp 
says, " The righteous dead are in the place due to them : they are 
with the Lord." Irenaeus says, " The souls of departed saints go 
away to the place appointed for them of God." Justin Martyr 
says, " The souls of the pious remain somewhere in a better state, 
awaiting the time of judgment." Origen says, " The soul when 

258 



it departs from the world, shall be disposed of according to its 
merits, enjoying the inheritance of eternal life." Cyprian says, 
11 The dead are not gone away, but gone forward. Even before 
the day of judgment, the just and the unjust are separated from 
each other — the chaff and wheat are already divided." Athana- 
sius says, M That is not death which befalleth the righteous, but a 
translation." Marcarius says, "When the righteous depart from 
the body, the choirs of angels receive their souls to their own places, 
to the pure world, and so bring them to God." Augustine says, 
11 When we die we do not fall into nothing, into a profound sleep, 
or into a state of insensibility, until the resurrection ; but we only 
change our place. ' ' Ambrose says, ' ' Death is but the separation 
of soul and body, not the annihilation of soul and body. No 
sooner are soul and body divorced, until the soul is come on the 
wings of angels to the kingdom of God." 

Of course, the inspired Volume is our ultimate resort in the con- 
sideration of the condition of those who have parted company with 
the body ; and it sheds no dim, uncertain light as we turn our feet 
within the circle of its radiance. Standing at Calvary, as the Son of 
God accomplishes the atonement in behalf of a condemned and 
dying world, I hear the repentant thief implore His gracious 
remembrance ; and scarcely has he preferred his request, until 
from the hallowed lips of the Lord of life and glory falls the 
assuring response, " Today shalt thou be with Me in Paradise." 
Beholding Stephen hurried from the earth, beneath a storm of 
stones rained out of murderous hands, I see the heavens open, 
and Jesus, erect at the right hand of God, waiting to answer the 
prayer of the devoted saint, "Lord Jesus, receive my spirit." 
Conversing with Paul concerning his prospective exit, he exult- 
ingly proclaims, " Henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of 
righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, shall give 
me at that day : and not to me only, but unto all them that love 
His appearing." Listening to John, reporting the celestial mes- 
sage intended for the inspiration of the Church at Kphesus, as it 
struggles amid the billows of tribulation, I catch the announce- 

259 



ment, " Be thou faithful unto death, and I will give thee a crown 
of life." Verily, Revelation establishes nothing if it does not 
establish the fact that the spirit outlives the body, and continues 
to be an intelligent and responsible agent subsequent to its 
removal from human society. 

But, if still in existence, it must have the freedom of some 
particular scene of existence. Somewhere it must have posses- 
sion of a congenial residence. Somewhere it must have play and 
scope for its activities. Precisely where, I can not indicate. I 
can not locate its home. I can not map out its circumstances. 
I can not portray the felicities and splendors of which it has the 
range. It is, however, where the Lord is. For the Lord assures 
the malefactor by His side, ''Thou shalt be with Me;" and 
promises the stricken disciples, " I will come again, and receive 
you unto Myself ; that where I am, there ye may be also ; ' ' and 
proclaims through Paul that to be absent from the body is to be 
present with the Lord. 

Now, we know that the Lord is not in the tomb. It proved 
inadequate to His retention. Its barriers gave way before rising 
Omnipotence, like withes of sand. He came up a Conqueror from 
its arena. Enfolding Himself with a raiment of clouds, in the 
presence of the gazing disciples, and escorted by a retinue of 
angels, He ascended from Olivet, was received up into Heaven, 
and is set down on the right hand of God. 

And, in the same regions of supreme excellence and glory, 
are gathered immediately from the gates of death the spirits of 
all who die in the Lord. Nor are they merely in the same locality 
with Him. Heaven is a realm of immense amplitude, and its 
residents might be at an immense distance from each other. But 
there is no appreciable distance between the saints and their 
Saviour : for His unambiguous guarantee is, " Where I am, there 
ye may be also." Nor stand they dazed and unrecognized before 
Him. They are not awed and silent witnesses of a splendid 
pageant. They see Him as He is. They follow Him whither- 
soever He goeth. God Himself is with them, and is their God. 

260 



They shake their homestead with the acclaim, Alleluia ! Salva- 
tion, and glory, and honor, and power, unto the Lord our God ! " 

Nor have they only communion with Him. They recognize 
each other. They exult in mutual intercourse. Tottering into 
the tomb, Jacob calls back, "I am to be gathered unto my 
people." Bewailing his deceased child, David cries, " I shall go 
to him." Proposing the encouragement of the Hebrew Chris- 
tians, Paul affirms, "Ye are come to the spirits of just men 
made perfect." Commending the marvellous faith of the 
centurion of Capernaum, Jesus reveals the social life of the 
immortals, in His portraiture of them, as set down with Abraham, 
Isaac, and Jacob, in the kingdom of God. 

Nor have they been withdrawn from all interest in those who 
still linger along the paths of Probation. No essential of being 
has been eliminated in their translation to sublimer conditions. 
Their eyes follow us in the house of our pilgrimage. Their 
hearts covet our weal. They come forth in ministries in our be- 
half. Amid the grandeurs of the Transfiguration, the disciples 
heard Moses and Elias conversing with their Master concerning 
His approaching decease. From their celestial seats, Abraham 
and Lazarus saw that the brothers of Dives were within reach of 
the means of grace, and in no need of special agencies from the 
skies. One day, while the door was ajar, a great voice of much 
people in Heaven fell on the ear of John, as he ranged the isle of 
Patmos ; and lo, it was the voice of martyrs, sounding the praise 
of the Lord for taking vengeance on their murderers. Importun- 
ing the Christians of his day to lay aside every weight, to part 
company with every besetting sin, and to run with patience their 
appointed race, Paul reminds them that witnesses, gathered from 
former dispensations of the Church, from heavenly heights are 
gazing on their course. 

They are in Paradise — the Eden of the universe : the realm 
of supreme beauty and happiness and holiness and knowledge ; 
the place where, in human form, the Lord of all holds His court ; 
the center where converge all who have washed their robes, and 

261 



made them white in the blood of the Lamb ; the house of our 
Father, and His Father, with mansions enough for all who, by 
patient continuance in well-doing, shall seek for glory and honor 
and immortality, and so plume themselves for eternal life. 

" There is a world above, 

Where parting is unknown ; 
A whole eternity of love, 

Formed for the good alone : 
And faith beholds the dying here 
Translated to that happier sphere." 

Look ! there are stars even on the brow of Death. 
I profess no preference for the grave as an highway to Elysian 
fields. The bright beyond does not lure me to admiration of the 
intervening tunnel. Its preceding pains, its accompanying dis- 
abilities, its removal from familiar scenes, its departure from con- 
genial companions, its sundering of love-knit ties, its anxieties 
about the darlings who are left behind, its dishonor of the body, so 
long the carrier of the soul — these attendants of the grave I would 
be glad to escape. I wish sin had never found its way into the 
world. I wish the radiant Seraphim had never crossed their 
swords around the Tree of Life, and restrained humanity from 
access to the invigorating fruit borne by its wide-spreading boughs. 
Then, beautiful and glad as departure for a visit to cherished 
friends and inviting scenes, would have been the manner of man's 
exchange of earth for Heaven. 

Nevertheless, much is said of death which is unjust and un- 
truthful. Artists, orators and poets, pretending to give his por- 
trait, paint and pronounce and sing many a falsehood. He is not 
so much an alarm, as he is the luller of all alarms. He is not so 
much a foe, as he is the victor of all foes. He is not so much a 
monster, as he is a messenger. He is not so much a robber, as 
he is a remedy. He is not so much a woe, as he is a weal. It is 
not his fault if his coming is not the end of all our ills, and our 
uplifting to associations and climes where life shall take on new 
beauty, be robed with new power, and open out into new and un- 
fading luxury. 

262 



Our friends who have fallen asleep in Jesus have not fared 
badly by their removal from the bodies in which we remember 
them. Though we miss them so much, and though their bodies 
lie mouldering in the tomb, or have passed into other combina- 
tions, and though their souls have not yet entered into their loftiest 
possible conditions, still they are in the inheritance of a vastly 
improved and more excellent estate. To them, death is already 
gain. Dying, they lingered a moment in sympathy with our 
bereavement ; waved us an affectionate good-bye ; said a glad 
farewell to sin and woe ; dropped the weapons of their warfare ; 
donned the goodlier raiment of the immortals ; then surrendered 
themselves to celestial companionships ; moved upward along the 
heavenly highway ; swept in through the portals of the skies ; 
bathed in the benediction of Immanuel ; exchanged greetings 
with the darlings who had gone on before ; have made the ac- 
quaintance of many of the nobles of the Church Triumphant ; 
have seen many of the beauties which gem the world of light ; 
have tasted many of the felicities which throng the garden of 
God ; have learned many of the paths which lead into still richer 
raptures ; and are for ever with the Lord — thrilled with the vision, 
jubilant with the prospect of ever- enlarging blessedness, and 
burning with desire for the period when we shall bound into their 
arms and, once more, and for ever, be a family together, 

" Where all the millions of His saints 

Shall in one song unite, 
And each the bliss of all shall view 

With infinite delight." 

Immortal thanks to Him — the Father of our Lord Jesus 
Christ, the Father of mercies, and the God of all comfort — Who 
deals so generously with our friends who, as the years have come 
and gone, have passed out of our homes and sight ; and Who, for 
our cheer and inspiration, reveals so much of their condition sub- 
sequent to death ! 

The discussion almost makes me homesick. I am in no 
hurry to die. Life is pleasant. I have much of love and work 

263 



to bind me to earth. The peace of Christ largely counterbalances 
all I have of toil and trial. I would like, if God allows, to stay 
still for years, and help roll the world backward to its primeval 
integrity and weal, and forward to a better heritage than even 
optimists imagine. But as I talk, death loses much of his dread- 
fulness. The Beyond grows brighter. Heaven looks sweeter. 

" There happier bowers than Eden's bloom, 

Nor sin nor sorrow know : 
Blest seats ! through rude and stormy scenes, 

I onward press to you " 



264 



XXVIII. 

" The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death." — I. Corinthians, 
15:26. 

Death is not the final condition of the saint who has for ever 
vacated his place in the Church Militant. It is neither the annihi- 
lation of the body, nor the extinction of the soul, nor the per- 
petual separation of the two. 

Dying, his soul is borne by angelic ministry into a scene of 
enjoyment and rest, where all the adverse influences of Probation 
are escaped, where wider opportunities unfold their wings, and 
where the smile of Immanuel and the society of the saved make 
perennial rapture. 

His body, however, is still in the grave, taking on innumer- 
able phases, and undergoing innumerable transmutations. But 
this is not the last of that human form, any more than it is the 
last of its former tenant. The removal of the tenant is not its 
reduction to non-entity or oblivion. The house shall be rebuilt. 
The old occupant shall move back on the first breath of a coming 
Spring, and the reunited two subsist eternally as one personality, 
in higher estate, and amid sublimer scenes, than those of their 
original connection. If a man die, he shall live again. But he 
does not live again, unless all that entered essentially into his 
former being is present in his restored being — unless, except as 
sin had changed and stained him, he is as he was before death had 
overthrown him. 

Therefore, there shall be a Resurrection of the 
dead. I, of course, do not mean that the body shall come up 
from the grave exactly as it was laid away in that house appointed 
for all the living — that, in either fashion, or particles, or weight, 
the latter shall be a precise reproduction of the first. But I do 
mean that the grave shall not, through all the ages of duration, 
restrain from the air and light and potencies of life a single atom 
essential to the completeness of the personality dismantled by the 
agency of death. I do mean that, whether it be little or much, 

265 



whatever in the old organism is requisite to establish and identify 
the new as its legitimate outcome, shall come forth amid the glow- 
ing glories of the morning of the Resurrection. 

The very apprehension of the contrary is a stunning blow to 
the best instincts of our nature. It clothes our pilgrimage to the 
tomb with shadows, and enwraps the hour of dissolution with a 
despair and horror which language has no competence to repre- 
sent. In the presence of that hour, Hobbs declares that he is 
stepping out into the dark ; Hume discloses his alarm by his 
bluster ; and Ingersoll forgets the classic prose with which he had 
arranged to commit his sister to the dust. 

Verily, our nature hopes for the resurrection of the dead. 
This hope is its impulse in the honor paid the body in its disposal 
when the vital spark is fled ; its inspiration in the adornment and 
care of the places of the buried ; and its talisman against a 
broken heart when covering with kisses the lips of the dying. 

Even in the darkness of the dawn of the true religion upon 
the horizon of humanity, there gleamed the conviction that from 
death there is a road back to life. Therefore, Abraham, offering 
up Isaac, accounts that God is able to raise him up, even from the 
dead ; Joseph gives commandment concerning his bones ; and 
Job shouts, " In my flesh shall I see God." 

With us, however, the dawn has ripened into day. Life and 
immortality have been brought to light through the preaching of 
the Gospel. The Son of God has visited the world. His lips 
have announced, " I am the Resurrection and the Life;" the 
brother of Mary and Martha, the daughter of Jairus, and the son 
of the widow of Nain, are monuments of the establishment of His 
claim ; and His own triumphant egress from the vault of Joseph 
of Arimathea, is the everlasting and indubitable proof that His 
death was the extinction of neither His being nor His power. 
" Now is Christ risen from the dead, and become the first-fruits 
of them that slept. For since by man came death, by Man came 
also the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, even 
so in Christ shall all be made alive. " ^ 

266 



"These bodies that corrupted fall 

Shall incorrupt arise, 
And mortal forms shall spring to life 

Immortal in the skies." 

It seems to me that, under the Economy of Redemp- 
tion, the Resurrection of the dead is essential to the 
expression of the perfection and supremacy of the Son 
of God. The whole human life was forfeited in the great primal 
revolt against the Divine authority. Death was the righteously 
earned due of the transgressor. Neither body nor soul had a 
right to a moment more of existence. But, lo ! the executioner 
tarries, and the Daysman appears, announcing, " I have found a 
ransom," and kindling all the skies with the radiance of forgive- 
ness and restoration. The seed of the woman has made propiti- 
ation for sin, and, on the acceptance and improvement of the 
propitiation, the sinner is to have back his life — not an inferior 
or partial life, but his life. "As in Adam all die, even so in 
Christ shall all be made alive." 

How can the Daysman be good, and allow the saint to go 
eternally shorn of a portion of his being, and of a portion through 
which there has come to him no insignificant measure of the bliss 
of being ? How can the Daysman be just, and allow a portion of 
the saint which has borne largely the disabilities and disasters of 
Probation, to taste none of the sweets of Recompense ? How can 
the Daysman be omnipotent, and stand idly by and allow His 
friends, who have followed His fortunes through innumerable and 
oppressive woes, to wander, mere fragments of themselves, 
through all the cycles of duration ? How can the Daysman be 
truthful — the God of truth, and allow those who, turning to Him 
with full purpose of heart, have hung their faith and hope and 
love upon the very letter of His word, to awaken in the disap- 
pointment of the expectations beneath whose impulse they have 
gone marching onward ? How can the Daysman wield the 
sceptre of supremacy, and allow Satan perpetual possession of 
some of the spoils secured in that raid he made upon the empire 
of Jehovah in the Garden of Eden ? How can the Daysman win 

267 



the price of his atonement, and allow a part of the consideration 
for which he bore the mighty load, folded in an ignominious 
napkin, to lie for ever in the " potter's field ?" 

Oh ! the very character and empire of the Messiah require 
the resurrection of the dead. Until that illustrious consummation, 
His dominion is incomplete, He is out of His own, one of His 
enemies still holds the fort and flouts the flag of rebellion. Not 
until the grave shall surrender its tenantry, shall the last enemy 
be destroyed, and the Son of God sit down victorious upon His 
throne, His enemies all made His footstool. 

" Say, ' Live for ever, wondrous King ! 

Born to redeem, and strong to save ; ' 
Then ask the monster, ' Where's thy sting ? ' 

And, ' Where's thy victory, boasting grave? ' " 

In the Resurrection of the dead, there will bb a 
clear consciousness and manifestation of individual 
identity. Certainly, all the atoms ever belonging to the body, 
prior to its descent into the grave, will not be gathered into the 
companion with which the soul, at the termination of Time, is to 
sally forth for the circuit of Eternity. Certainly, it will be fet- 
tered and marred with none of the disabilities and deformities 
which have fettered and marred its continuance in its present scene 
of existence. Certainly, it will be vastly beautified, improved and 
invigorated — every way adapted to the sublimer conditions of 
which it is henceforth to have the range. 

Certainly, it will be a material organism. However spiritu- 
alized, it will be a body in distinction from the soul — a distinction 
as pronounced and real as that which now subsists between these 
two parties to one personality. 

Certainly, whatever may be the character and source of its 
constituents, it will be the legitimate successor of itself. It will 
be the natural reproduction of itself. It will be so akin and alike 
to itself as to at once attract its old inmate, and identify the re- 
stored man to all who have had acquaintance with his form and 
history. 

268 



Even from the traditions which had floated down the stream 
of intervening ages, Peter and James and John recognized Moses 
and Elijah upon the mount of Transfiguration. Mary and Martha 
knew it was Lazarus who was going home with them from the 
tomb over which they so recently had poured the tears of bereave- 
ment. The disciples were sure it was Jesus Whose " All hail " 
saluted them by the way, and Whose presence mantled that morn- 
ing with colors such as morning had never before worn. 

Just as certainly, when humanity shall undergo its great 
clothing upon, will I be sure of myself, and of all I have ever 
known in the flesh. Passing in and out of the congregation of 
the skies, I will gaze with no doubtful vision upon those I en- 
counter. I will not have to say, in response to any salutation, 
1 ' You have the advantage of me ; ' ' nor arrest the greeting of 
some dear old friend by remarking, ' ' There is something familiar 
about you, but I can not name you ; ' ' nor chill the welcome of 
some darling by observing, ' ' I ought to know you, but I do not. ' ' 
In every case, the identity will be too apparent, and the recogni- 
tion too intuitive, for delay or discussion. 

" Give joy or grief, give ease or pain : 

Take life or friends away ; 
But let me find them all again 
In that eternal day." 

The properties OF the bodies which will be developed 
in the Resurrection of the dead now invite our thought. 
I have never seen one of these resplendent bodies, and can give, 
from personal inspection, no representation of their wondrous 
fashion and endowments. There is on record no detailed por- 
traiture of them by any whose privilege it has been to take in the 
enrapturing spectacle. Perhaps such vision is necessarily impossi- 
ble to mortal eyes, and incomprehensible to mortal intellect until 
it shall have soared beyond its own present limitations. Certain 
hints found here and there throughout the Volume of Revelation 
furnish our only data. These hints suggest that 

These bodies will be of finer organism. Their grosser belong- 

269 



ings will be left behind. All of exclusive relation to the terres- 
trial estate will be eliminated. All of their essential qualities will 
be sublimated into meetness for their celestial surroundings and 
uses. "There are also celestial bodies, and bodies terrestrial: 
but the glory of the celestial is one, and the glory of the terrestrial 
is another." 

They will be exempt from decay. They will be subject to neither 
wear nor tear. Neither anxiety nor fatigue, neither cold nor 
fever, neither sun nor shade, will undermine their integrity. 
They are "sown in corruption ;" but they are " raised in incor- 
ruption. ' ' 

They will be inaccessible to death. The rest that " remaineth for 
the people of God " is no hunting-ground for the insatiate Archer 
who so long has had the freedom of all human habitations. 
Neither accident nor disease, neither contagion nor heredity, 
neither carelessness nor malice, will blow out the ruddy flame 
kindled at eternal fires. The mortal will have " put on immor- 
tality." 

They will be of exceeding excellence. They will no longer be 
bodies of humiliation, but they will be bodies of transcendent 
dignity. In carriage, feature, form, they will be of surpassing 
loveliness and majesty. They shall " shine forth as the sun." 
They are "sown in dishonor," but they will be "raised in 
glory." 

They will be of marvellous endurance and strength. No more 
will they be the sport of climes and seasons. No more will they 
need the night for recuperation in its bosom from the waste of the 
day. No more will they need the Sabbath to gather up from the 
labor of the week. No more will they measure toil by hours, or 
travel by miles. Illimitable fields will invite their activities, and 
immortal pulses throb for their sufficiency. Achievement will go 
hand in hand with volition. They will be "sown in weakness ;" 
but they will be " raised in power." 

They will be of spiritual essence. They will be as genuine 
bodies as those which have brought us to this service. They will 

270 



be as material bodies as those through which we come in contact 
with form and substance here. But they will be so ethereal and 
refined as never to antagonize or restrain the princely guests they 
lodge. Here the material is often an incubus on the immaterial. 
But there the immaterial will be so thorougly in the ascendant 
that the material will be its cordial and responsive handmaid — a 
willing chariot in which it shall, at its pleasure, go "careering 
gayly over the curling waves " of the beatific realms. They are 
"sown natural bodies;" but they will be "raised spiritual 
bodies. ' ' 

"Arrayed in glorious grace 

Shall these poor bodies shine, 
And every shape, and every face, 

Be heavenly and divine." 

The doctrine of the Resurrection of the dead is 
not without its mysteries. It is an event of which we have 
had no experience. We have never been subjects of the wonder- 
ful uprising. None of us has ever known what it is to have the 
vital principle withdrawn, and the material habitation which has 
been its lodging taken apart, laid away among the clods of the 
valley, and then called up into more than its original excellence. 

And it is also an event of which we have had no observation. 
Often have we endeavored to convince ourselves that the death of 
our darlings was a dream. Sometimes we have sought to per- 
suade ourselves that our departed dear would once more bound 
into our arms as we sauntered through their former scenes of 
being. But they have never returned. Our eyes have never 
looked upon one who had gone the way of all the earth. 

A thousand difficulties can be rallied against the great 
awakening. It is a field where human energy and genius have 
never won a triumph. It is a laboratory where human art and 
science have never wrought out a proximate accomplishment. 
Complete and frequent changes are constantly occurring in the 
deceased body. Its particles are scattered through air and land 
and sea. One portion of it has become incorporated into another 
body ; and another into a flower ; and another into a stone. It 

271 



has been partitioned among the animal and mineral and vegetable 
kingdoms. It is no longer an organism. 

Nevertheless, I believe in the resurrection of the dead. To 
my mind it is no more an impossibility than a myriad of facts and 
occurrences which I know to be facts and occurrences. Notwith- 
standing the assaults of the elements through crowding centuries, 
I know Sinai is the identical mountain upon whose peaks Jehovah 
published His law. Notwithstanding the change effected by 
Divine judgment in the surface, I know Sodom and Gomorrah are 
the same site as when Lot left them for his life. Notwithstanding 
the inroads of enemies, and the dust carried off on the feet of 
devoted friends, and the wear and tear of Time, I know Bethlehem 
and Calvary and Gethsemane and Herrnon and Olivet are the 
same spots on which my Saviour worked out the problem of my 
salvation. And, notwithstanding all the mutations which await 
my body between its burial and its bridal, I believe that in my 
flesh I shall see God. It is no more mysterious to me than my 
birth. I can credit and comprehend the one as easily as the 
other. I have no more mental strain in believing that, when 
death and the grave shall deliver up their dead, I shall be 
myself in body and in soul, than I have in believing I am the 
same being who hung, an infant of a day, upon my mother's 
breast, though now, after many years, and after having under- 
gone innumerable sicknesses and wastes, I am a man with 
children of my own about me as my comfort and company. 

How the mighty change and upbuilding will be accom- 
plished, I do not understand. Neither do I understand how I was 
born and live. But I have the word of God. How He will keep 
His word is no doubt-kindling query to me. He Who created me, 
can recreate me. He Who first established me in identity, can 
re-establish me. Knowing what I do of His achievements, I 
know He can never want either resources or skill to achieve any 
effect requisite to the observance of His covenant. He Who can 
bring the day out of the tomb of night, lead spring out of the lap 
of winter, and uprear the living harvest from the vault where 

272 



corn and wheat were thrown dry and withered, wields all the 
potencies necessary to rebuild in a diviner form His perished 
image. He Who ordains that the soulless magnet shall gather 
responsive particles of steel from the midst of innumerable other 
substances and attach them to itself as trophies of its power, can 
find in grave or coral-deep, in land or water, in part or in whole, 
all that is essential to my physical completeness ; attenuate, 
enlarge, or modify it, according to its chosen pattern ; and give 
it to my beatified and undying soul in a marriage which shall 
never know divorce. Oh, God is God, and it is not to me an 
incredible thing that God shall raise the dead. 

'• God, my Redeemer, lives, 

And ever, from the skies, 
Looks down, and watches all my dust, 

Till He shall bid it rise." 

Then, Death, go on plying thy dismal trade ! Go on with 
thy work of blight and woe ! Go on withdrawing men and women 
and children from the activities and joys of earth ! Go on break- 
ing up human homes, and bursting human hearts with the anguish 
of separation ! Go on, thou hateful bailiff, turning the immaterial 
dweller out of his material tenement ! Thy time is short. Make 
all thou canst out of thy miserable office. Thou thyself art under 
sentence of death. Thy reprieve is only temporary. A new ad- 
ministration is shortly coming to the front, and thy occupation is 
over. An immortal Spring is on the way : and, amid its beams 
and blossoms, we expect to enter upon the possession of a house, 
not with the leave of a renter, but with the title of an owner — a 
house from which we can defy all process of ejection ; a house 
with enough in its fashion and furniture brought from the old one 
to make us feel at home ; a house with enough new in its con- 
struction and decoration to meet the new demands of its renewed 
resident ; a house which no change of style will ever leave incom- 
plete and outworn ; a " house not made with hands, eternal in the 
heavens ! " 

All hail, thou Resurrection Morning ! Just now earth is full 

273 



of the bodies of the saints. Coming years will make it fuller. 
We and ours are to enlarge the countless company. But our 
Saviour has been in the grave before us. He left a lamp in the 
midst of its gloom, scattered the odor of Paradise through all its 
chambers, and softened its rock into a bed of down. In His own 
loving arms we are borne into its bosom, His own hand carries 
the key, and His angels are watching at the door. 

It will not be long till sunrise. The night is hung with stars. 
The sky is vocal with assurances of awakening. Our redemption 
draweth nigh. Celestial reapers, waving burnished sickles, are 
ready for the harvest. In a little while will be heard the shout of 
the descending Lord. His last enemy will be destroyed. God's 
acre will stand thick with sheaves waiting for the garner. Those 
who have been asleep in Jesus will rally to His standard, close in 
behind Him as He heads the triumphal column for His Father's 
throne, and kindle seraphic ranks to sublimer rapture as they sing, 
"Thanks be unto God Who giveth us the victory, through our 
Lord Jesus Christ. ' ' 

" Fearless we lay us in the tomb, 

And sleep the night away:" 
Since Christ is " there to break the gloom, 

And call us back to day." 



274 



XXIX. 



"When the Son of Man shall come in His glory, and all the holy angels 
with Him, then shall He sit upon the throne of His glory : And before 
Him shall be gathered all nations : and He shall separate them one from 
another, as a shepherd divideth his sheep from the goats : And He shall 
set the sheep on His right hand, but the goats on the left. Then shall the 
King say unto them on His right hand, Come, ye blessed of My Father, 
inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world." — 
Matthew, 25 : 31, 32, 33, 34. 

The saint going the way of all the earth, his soul has passed 
immediately into a condition of unalloyed blessedness — a condi- 
tion immeasurably beyond all previous experience, and steadily 
pouring into the possession of its occupant increasing measures of 
enjoyment and excellence. 

His body, in the meanwhile, has been left behind. By vari- 
ous processes and stages it has been disintegrated and scattered 
until it is no longer an organism. It is so thoroughly dissolved 
as to preclude the identification of a single particle by even the 
most affectionate and discerning. 

In the case of those who live toward the close of the present 
order of things, the body will remain thus dishonored and unrecog- 
nized for a correspondingly brief period ; but, in countless in- 
stances death will maintain dominion through countless centuries. 

At last, however, the end comes. The sun recrosses the 
vernal equinox. The living, without subjection to the grave, 
undergo the everlasting clothing upon. The heavens smile upon 
the sepulchres of those who sleep in Jesus. Their bodies are 
re-established. Their souls are once more at home. Each saint is 
himself again. 

"An angel's arm can't snatch me from the grave — 
Regions of angels can't confine me there." 

Nevertheless, human history is not yet complete. The light 
of Revelation does not fail us yet. But, "after this, the judg- 
ment." 

275 



A day of Judgment awaits the entire human family. 
Its circumstances are only partially outlined in the Sacred Oracles; 
and these Oracles are our only authority and guide in the investi- 
gation of the solemn theme. Its precise period in the future is 
not apparent. " Of that day and hour knoweth no man." In 
the Divine bosom the mighty secret is concealed. Its fact, how- 
ever, is beyond question. " The Lord shall endure for ever : He 
hath prepared His throne for judgment. And He shall judge the 
world in righteousness.' ' ' ' God shall bring every work into judg- 
ment, with every secret thing, whether it be good, or whether it 
be evil." " He hath appointed a day, in which He will judge 
the world in righteousness." "So then every one of us shall 
give account of himself to God." 

The announcement of the fact by the voice of Inspiration 
commands the assent of our conscience ; for conscience is a court 
within us, calling us to its bar, declaring our character, and en- 
forcing its decrees by the reminder of a superior and supreme 
tribunal from whose awards there is no appeal. And it commands 
the assent of our reason ; for reason infers that God's creation of 
man implies God's government of him, and government implies 
law, and law implies an inquest as to its observance. And it com- 
mands the assent of our views of right ; for those views shut us 
up to the conclusion that, if the Ruler of men does not look with 
equal eyes upon righteousness and wickedness, there must be a 
readjustment of the conditions of the two so that wickedness may 
not seem to have so largely the ascendant in advantage. 

There is no alternative. Unless the Bible is a blind, and 
Conscience a cheat, and God a delusion, and Government a mock- 
ery, and Right a myth, "the Lord Jesus shall be revealed from 
Heaven with His mighty angels, in flaming fire, taking vengeance 
on them that know not God, and that obey not the Gospel of our 
Lord Jesus Christ : who shall be punished with everlasting de- 
struction from the presence of the Lord, and from the glory of 
His power ; when He shall come to be glorified in His saints, and 
to be admired in all them that believe." 

276 



" That awful day will surely come, 

The appointed hour makes haste, 
When I must stand before my Judge, 

And pass the solemn test." 

The general Judgment will include all the chil- 
dren of men. Thither shall be gathered all nations. Death 
and Hades shall have delivered up the dead which were in them. 
The small and great of all the families of earth shall stand before 
the great white throne, and be judged, every man according to 
his works. " For we must all appear before the judgment seat of 
Christ ; that every one may receive the things done in his body, 
according to that he hath done, whether it be good or bad." No 
character will release from appearance at the august assize. It is 
the day for the exhibition and proclamation of all character — the 
day when all disguise shall be removed, all tinsel torn away, and 
the real stamped with the signet of immortality. From this on, 
" he that is filthy " shall " be filthy still, and he that is holy " 
shall " be holy still." No circumstances will secure escape from 
the ordeal. Angelic espionage shall peer through every hiding- 
place. Divine scrutiny shall search through every subterfuge. 
There shall be no concealment when the detective forces of Om- 
niscience shall go forth upon the chase of Justice. 

"Day of judgment, day cf wonders ! 

Hark ! the trumpet's awful sound, 
Louder than a thousand thunders, 

Shakes the vast creation round : 

How the summons 

Will the sinner's heart confound !" 

On the throne of Judgment, conducting all its proc- 
esses, sits THE son of man. "The Father judgeth no man, 
but hath committed all judgment unto the Son." " He hath ap- 
pointed a day, in which He will judge the world in righteous- 
ness by that Man Whom He hath ordained. ' ' 

This Man is our old Friend and Saviour, Jesus Christ — the 
"Word" Who "was made flesh, and dwelt among us," and 
Whose glory we have so often seen among the shadows of Proba- 
tion, "the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of 

277 



grace and truth: " the Lover of our souls, "in Whom, though 
now we see Him not, yet believing, we rejoice with joy unspeak- 
able and full of glory." Full of glory ! — no longer the humble 
and wayworn pilgrim of Galilee, or the jest of the mob, or the 
prisoner of Pilate ; but compassed with angels, the Arbiter of uni- 
versal doom, and radiant with all the lustre of unquestioned 
supremacy. A Man ! — an ally, in birth, and experience, and in- 
cident, to those who are waiting for His announcement to fix their 
fate for ever : and therefore able to correctly estimate their capacity 
and obligation. A Divine Man ! — clothed with all the attributes, 
and possessed of all the authority of Godhead : and therefore com- 
petent to analyze every act, feeling, and thought, of every in- 
dividual in the countless company ; to discern every motive ; to 
estimate every peculiarity ; and to measure every portion. The 
Lord from Heaven ! — making Himself of no reputation ; taking 
upon Him the form of a servant ; assuming the likeness of men ; 
humbling Himself unto death, even the death of the cross ; through 
His oblation of Himself holding back the day of trial, that de- 
generate humanity may rally for the crisis ; and giving to as many 
as receive Him power to become the sons of God. 

Oh, Thou Son of Man, Thine exaltation is Thy due ! L,aj'- 
ing aside the beatitudes and endowments of the skies that Thou 
mightest make a mission of recovery to our fallen world, it is meet 
that Thou shouldest have the dispensation of appropriate penalties 
to those who abjure Thy gracious overture, and of appropriate 
recompense to those who accept Thy merciful and saving proffers ! 

And, Oh, the matchless comfort of His interposition to us 
who commit the keeping of ourselves to Him in well-doing ! The 
comfort that our Daysman is our Judge ; that our Advocate is to 
wear the ermine of decision when we are under review for a death- 
less award ; that the arm which is now our consolation and suffi- 
ciency, is to poise the balance of our destiny ; that the hands which 
have been extended in the bestowment of so many benedictions as 
we have gone camping through the wilderness, are to deal out our 
future fortunes ; that the lips which have pronounced so many 

278 



intercessions upon our heads in the house of our pilgrimage, are 
to pronounce the decree which is to hang around those heads the 
insignia of unchangeable retribution ! 

There is a legend, interpreted on canvas by the magic pencil 
of Titian, that at the death of Charles the Fifth, the accusing 
angel appeared at the throne of the L,ord of all with a long, ter- 
rible array of crimes against the monarch — cities burned and 
pillaged, countries blighted and smitten, children and women 
orphaned and widowed by the murder of fathers and husbands. 
There is alleged neither denial nor palliation. Even Mercy puts 
in no plea. Blood cries for blood. The Emperor kneels before 
the dread tribunal, confessing his infirmities, neither abject nor 
bold, but awaiting the issue in absolute faith that the Judge of all 
the earth will do right. And the Judge speaks, saying that the 
King was sent into the world at a peculiar time, for a peculiar pur- 
pose, and must be allowed the benefit of his peculiar conditions. 
Verily, the scales of allotment are in clean and honest hands ! 
Friends of the Son of Man, you may hie your way serenely to His 
presence. 

" My soul, with cheerful eye, 

See where thy Saviour stands, 
The glorious Advocate on high, 

With incense in His hands." 

Thus we come to the study of the righteous in the 
day of Judgment. Future human condition is unalterably 
determined, in every individual instance, prior to this general 
review. It is determined in death : the righteous departing into 
an estate of blessedness from which they are never to lapse, and 
the wicked departing into an estate of wretchedness from which 
they are never to ascend. The former estate is represented in the 
Scripture of the hour as the right hand of the King. Therefore, 
even at the commencement of the final inquest, the final condition 
of the ransomed of the Lord is already assured. Their character 
is already ascertained and fixed. As the great white throne 
moves into position, they are standing to the right — the elite of 

279 



the world, the clearly indicated favorites of Jehovah, the dis- 
tinctly chosen heirs of a goodly inheritance : a multitude which 
no man can number, gathered from all climes and dispensations, 
brimming with delight, and radiant with the expectation of delight 
still greater. 

There is no array of the sins of their unregeneracy. They 
were all sinners — some of them sinners of long continuance, and 
of most fearful grade. But none of their sins is now brought into 
remembrance. They come to the front wearing the raiment of 
forgiveness and regeneration. Down among the ways of Proba- 
tion they laid hold of the hope set before them in the Gospel ; 
and upon the back of the appointed Substitute their transgressions 
were borne into the wilderness, never again to return to plague 
them. In the day of their justification their misdeeds were 
covered: cast into the depths of the sea: separated from them as far 
as the east is from the west. Yea, it was one of the beatitudes of 
that happy day, that the God of all grace covenanted with them 
to remember their iniquity no more for ever. 

Merely the grade of their righteousness is under consider- 
ation. The tests to which they are subjected are merely to dis- 
play before the assembled hosts their degree of goodness, and so 
justify their assignment to the portions already allotted them in 
the Divine mind. 

The inquiry is as to the fidelity with which they have carried 
themselves since their acceptance in the Beloved ; as to their 
improvement of their gifts and opportunities ; as to the works 
which they have done in the name of their Lord and Savior ; and 
as to the zeal with which they have run their appointed race. To 
every one, on His enlistment, the Master had said, "Take this 
trust, and occupy till I come;" and every one is now interro- 
gated as to his occupancy of that trust. Every pound passes 
under review. This truth should never be off our consciences. 
In all the Inspired references to the great day of accounts, there 
is no hint that the inquest will be on creeds, or on experiences, or 
on professions. These are all of importance, but only as the 

280 



inspiration of works of righteousness. Works alone are canvassed 
as the basis of award. 

Oh, those who have gone down into the grave with no works 
done for Christ, do not even stand at the right hand of the Judge 
for judgment. They are not even honored with a place among 
the saints for examination. None are so much as called among 
that goodly company for a hearing, who have not done to the 
utmost of their capacity and chance for Christ. Fearful outlook 
for those who have no claim to Christianity except its form ! 

On that day of doom, soon as, in response to the Archangel's 
trumpet, earth's myriads gather to the dread tribunal, there will 
be instantaneous, universal recognition of the character of every 
individual destiny. Those on the left — they have all done evil or 
nothing ; and the only issue is as to the grade of their penalty ! 
Those on the right — they have all done good ; and the only issue 
is as to the grade of their recompense ! 

" I love to meet Thy people now, 
Before Thy feet with them to bow, 

Though feeblest of them all ; 
But, can I bear the piercing thought, 
What if my name should be left out 

When Thou for them shalt call ? " 

Having canvassed the conduct of the saints, the 
Judge pronounces their portion. He pronounces their ac- 
quittal from all guilt. The absolution spoken in their ears in that 
far-away hour when they came to the mercy seat crying, " God 
be merciful to me a sinner," is now affirmed in the ears of all the 
Universe. He pronounces their vindication from all the asper- 
sions which haunted them along the thoroughfares of Probation. 
The calumnies and misconstructions of earth brighten into honor 
and purity amid the radiance of Heaven. He pronounces the 
good deeds they have done while still dwellers in the world below: 
and lo, they find themselves credited with much with which they 
had not credited themselves. He pronounces the good deeds they 
have done since their sojourn in the flesh was finished — the long 
train of blessings that followed their example and gifts and in- 

281 



structions ; the churches they assisted to erect and support ; the 
lessons they taught in public and in private ; the missionaries 
they sent into scenes of spiritual darkness ; the poor to whom they 
ministered ; the sick they visited ; the orphaned for whom they 
cared ; and the widowed to whose stricken hearts they carried 
light for which, in their desolation, they had even ceased to hope. 
And then He pronounces, " Come, ye blessed of My Father, 
inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the 
world." Come! Ever since your espousals, you have been near 
Me — near Me along the whole length of your pilgrimage ; near 
Me as your heart and flesh failed in the hour of death ; near Me 
these long sweeps of years in the place of separate spirits ; near 
Me in the graves where your bodies lay ; but I covet a closer 
companionship. Come nearer. Come to My heart. Come here 
to My side. Come, sit down upon My throne. Come, be ever 
with Me : gems in My crown, monuments of My grace, trophies 
of My power. Come, and find your works a thousand fold repaid, 
your largest hopes ten thousand fold fulfilled. "Come, ye 
blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from 
the foundation of the world." 

" O'er the distant mountains breaking, 

Comes the reddening dawn of day : 
Rise, my soul, from sleep awaking, 

Rise, and sing, and watch, and pray. 
'Tis thy Saviour, 
On His bright, returning way." 

I have known one of our Pennsylvania judges for years. We 
were boys together. We have been intimately associated in riper 
age. I have been his pastor. I have often been an inmate of his 
home. He is impartial and upright in the administration of his 
office. Neither affection nor fear can carry it over his conviction 
of right. Should I be called into court, conscious of my inno- 
cence, how calmly would I bear myself as I saw him on the 
bench, and a dozen other reliable friends ready with indisputable 
testimony in my behalf ! My trial would merely be my glory. 

I know I am under summons to appear before such a bar as 

282 



earth has never seen, and that such interests as bar of earth has 
never pondered are in the scales. But the angels who have 
camped about me during my stay in the flesh are under subpoena 
as the witnesses, and my Saviour is on the bench. 

My burden lifts. My fear of the dread tribunal is gone. 
Long before the throne is set my destiny is fixed. Each passing 
hour is fixing it. My only care is for the years which are between 
me and death. Putting in those years in the companionship and 
love and service of the Son of Man, I can calmly bide my time. 
There is no occasion for concern beyond. Death is only my 
journey home, and the day of Judgment is only my day of coro- 
nation. 

"What will be the bliss and rapture, 

None can dream and none can tell, 
There to reign among the angels, 

In that heavenly home to dwell." 



2S3 



XXX. 

" Wherefore comfort one another with these words. "--I. Thessai<o- 
nians, 4 : 18. 

The region of the stars is not the remote and unknown region 
which it used to be. With the telescope as his assistant, the 
astronomer has gone careering through the skies, locating and 
mapping out their worlds, until they are more familiar to us than 
once the earth was to its inhabitants. 

For some time past we have been contemplating, in the 
radiance of Revelation, certain incidents and scenes in the future 
life of the children of God : — the soul, on its departure from the 
body, and during its continuance in the realm of spirits ; the 
Resurrection of the dead, and the re-establishment of the risen 
man in all his material and immaterial completeness ; the day of 
Judgment, recalling the character and conduct of Time, and deal- 
ing out the allotments and rewards of Eternity. And our light 
has not yet failed us. It illuminates summits still more distant, 
and carries our vision into periods still farther off. So, once more, 
we adjust our glass, poise it for a longer flight, and ponder the 
future home of the redeemed — the Heaven of our hopes. 

I ATTEMPT NO ARGUMENT IN BEHALF OF THE EXISTENCE OF 

Heaven. It essentially follows an admission of the immortality 
of the soul and the resurrection of the body. It is the instinctive 
belief of our childhood , and the deeply rooted faith of our maturer 
age. It is the fancy of those who have no light but the light of 
nature, and the hope of those who walk in the knowledge of 
the truth as it is in Jesus. It is the consummation of the Economy 
of Redemption. ' ' He became the Author of eternal salvation unto 
all them that obey Him." "Whom He did foreknow, He also 
did predestinate to be conformed to the image of His Son, that 
He might be the firstborn among many brethren. Moreover, 
whom He did predestinate, them He also called : and whom He 
called, them He also justified : and whom He justified, them He 
also glorified." It is the covenant of Jehovah, "Who will 

284 



render to every man according to his deeds : to them who by 
patient continuance in well doing seek for glory and honor and 
immortality, eternal lift \" 

" There is a home for weary souls 

By sin and sorrow driven, 
"When tossed on life's tempestuous shoals, 
Where storms arise, and ocean rolls, 

And all is drear : 'tis Heaven." 

Hkavkn is a locality. It is not merely a condition, " an 
aerial region where the inmates float in ether, or are mysteriously 
suspended upon nothing," — " an abode of dimness and mystery, 
so remote from human experience as to be beyond all compre- 
hension." It is an existence in space as definitely bounded as is 
the Republic of the United States, and as substantial as is the 
earth beneath our feet. 

It is an organization of matter. There is absolutely no war- 
rant for the notion that matter is essentially unheavenly. For all 
that appears to the contrary, it is as heavenly as spirit. It is as 
certainly God's creation. It shared His benediction when, hav- 
ing brought order out of preceding chaos, He " saw everything 
that He had made, and, behold, it was very good." His own Son 
wore it as the tabernacle of His Divinity for thirty-odd years 
among the sons of men, and then went back into the glory which 
He had with His Father before the world was, to wear it for ever. 
As far as we are competent to conclude, the human spirit, in order 
to its fullest exercise, requires some relation to matter. It is de- 
pendent on matter for much of its enjoyment and excellence. 
This is not an incident of the Fall. It was so anterior to the 
Fall. Without the aids with which it is dowered by the body, 
the soul would go shorn of much of its knowledge and holiness 
and happiness. Created that he might glorify God, and enjoy him 
for ever, man, largely material, was located amid material sur- 
roundings. Had there been no moral lapse, there is no reason to 
believe that there would ever have occurred any essential change 
in his organism ; and, without essential change in his organism, 
he would have required material surroundings ever more. Why. 

285 



then, after the Atonement of Immanuel shall have restored him, 
in both body and soul, will not material scenes and surroundings 
be good enough for the everlasting cycles ? 

Beyond all question, human constitution and hope and in- 
stinct indicate that Heaven is a locality in the Universe, as dis- 
tinct and real as any other portion in space — that somewhere in 
the realms of immensity, there is a material basis on which is up- 
reared the immortal homestead of the saints. 

And this is the legitimate inference from the sacred Scriptures. 
They call it a country, a house, an inheritance, a kingdom, a 
land, a mansion, a place — all designations of material things. 
They describe it as a scene of arrivals and departures, and of resi- 
dence by corporeal beings — as a scene to which such beings go, 
and in which they dwell, and from which for certain purposes they 
take their temporary leave. They refer to it in immediate con- 
nection with earth and hell, without any hint that one is less 
material than another. " If I ascend up into Heaven, Thou art 
there : if I make my bed in hell, behold, Thou art there. If I 
take the wings of the morning, and dwell in the uttermost parts 
of the sea ; even there shall Thy hand lead me, and Thy right 
hand shall hold me." " That at the name of Jesus every knee 
should bow, of things in Heaven, and things in earth, and things 
under the earth." They speak of it as Jerusalem, Paradise, 
Mount Zion. They talk of its crowns, gold, river, stones, temples, 
and tree. They tell of the translation to its occupancy of Enoch 
from antediluvian plains, and Elijah from the banks of the Jor- 
dan, and Jesus from the summit of Olivet. And they teach the 
resurrection of the bodies of the saints from the grave, and the up- 
lifting of the saints found alive at the second coming of the 
Redeemer. Why, 

" The stars are but the shining dust 

Of my Divine abode, 
The pavement of those heavenly Courts 

Where I shall reign with God." 

The exact location of Heaven is not revealed. 
Various conjectures have been indulged in this connection — some 

286 



imagining that, amid the worlds which crowd the realms ol 
Space, there is a central world, in the arrangement of which Divine 
Goodness has been especially liberal with its riches, and that here 
is the celestial homestead ; some imagining that it is far out upon 
the verge of Creation, too fair and holy for even vicinity to other 
portions of the empire of Jehovah ; some imagining that, at the 
close of the drama of Time, a new world will be fashioned amid 
the immeasurable regions of Immensity, and that here is Para- 
dise Restored ; and some imagining that the high distinction is 
reserved for our own earth, after it has gone through its baptism 
of fire, and so recovered from its share in the ruin wrought by 
human transgression. 

May there not be an element of truth in each of these con- 
jectures? Why may it not embrace all the scenes of existence 
not assigned as the prison of the lost ? Eternity is long enough 
to allow a residence of almost infinite duration in abodes so many 
that we have neither arithmetic nor fancy to compute the multi- 
tude ; and Immensity is wide enough to allow excursions to which 
there is no limit. Verily, it is no contracted spot which can soon 
be explored. There is no doubt some grand center where the 
ransomed shall congregate. But from that center there may be 
frequent divergence and travel. From that center colonies may 
go off to people new regions, and savants go off on scientific 
expeditions, and saints go off to hold a camp-meeting in some 
beautiful grove farther up the River of the Water of Life, and 
friends go off to some secluded bower, and sit down and talk of 
times they had together in the land of Probation. 

41 O, what a mighty change 

Shall Jesus' sufferers know, 
While o'er the happy plains they range 

Incapable of woe !" 

Hkavkn is the abodk of God. God is a Spirit. "The 
Heaven of heavens can not contain" Him. He is everywhere 
present. He fills Immensity. Yet we can not read the Holy 
Scriptures without the conviction that somewhere in the Universe 

287 



there is a place which is His particular habitation — a place where 
His throne stands, and around which cluster particular insignia 
of Divinity : "for thus saith the High and Lofty One that 
inhabiteth Eternity, Whose name is Holy : I DWELL in the 
high and holy place." "Be silent, O all flesh, before the 
Lord : for He is raised up out of His holy habitation." 

Nor can we read the Holy Scriptures without the conviction 
that thither, into the very neighborhood of the Author and 
Monarch of all being, are to gather for ever all who are found 
loyal to His sway. ' ' Blessed are the pure in heart : for they 
shall see God." " Thine eyes shall see the King in His beauty : 
they shall behold the land that is very far off. ' ' He may wear 
no form. In Himself He may be invisible to finite eyes, " dwell- 
ing in the light which no man can approach unto." But that 
very light tells that, within its fences and walls of such marvel- 
lous radiance, is God : and, looking toward that radiance, I shall 
carry myself as gladly and as reverently as Moses when treading 
around the flaming bush of the desert, and be as sure that I am 
in communion with Deity, that I am sunning myself in His very 
presence, as I am that I am now in the presence of your hearts, 
though your bodies hide your hearts from my eyes. For, after 
all, your hearts are you. 

" There God, our King and Portion, 

In fulness of His grace, 
Shall we behold for ever, 

And worship face to face." 

Heaven is the abode of Jesus Christ incarnate. I 
know not when the Son of God was first seen in the form of Man. 
Some have a notion that it was far back in the councils of Eternity, 
when the Godhead was in consultation about calling our race 
into being : and that the proposition, " Let Us make man in Our 
image, after Our likeness," includes resemblance in material, as 
well as in moral conditions — in body, as well as in soul. Be this 
as it may, I think the Son of God had on the form of the Son of 
Man when appearing as the Angel of the Covenant to the Ancient 

288 



Church: for Inspiration affirms, "The Lord went His way, as 
soon as He had left communing with Abraham ' ' in reference to 
the impending destruction of Sodom. 

Beyond question, He took this form in Judea when making 
His advent into the world for its redemption — took it, never more 
to lay it aside. " When the fulness of the time was come, God 
sent forth His Son, made of a woman, made under the law, to 
redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the 
adoption of sons." He " took man's nature in the womb of the 
blessed Virgin ; so that two whole and perfect natures, that is to 
say, the Godhead and Manhood, were joined together in one 
person, never to be divided ; whereof is one Christ, very God and 
very Man." And this one Christ, Divinity in a vesture oi 
humanity, after having been " crucified, dead, and buried," rose 
again from the grave, " and took again His body, with all things 
appertaining to the perfection of man's nature, wherewith He 
ascended into Heaven." There He is today, God manifest in the 
flesh, and there He shall be for ever, an object of feeling, and 
sight, and touch, by all the redeemed. 

" Majestic sweetness sits enthroned 

Upon the Saviour's brow : 
His head with radiant glories crowned, 

His lips with grace o'erflow." 

Heaven is the abode of Angei^s. They are the older 
sons of God, though, for all Revelation intimates to the contrary, 
new ones may be constantly coming into the company of the 
celestial host. They are of exceeding excellence of nature — 
highly endowed with the most illustrious attributes and circum- 
stances of being. They are of different grades, and have the 
occupancy of different spheres, though all are of exalted grade 
and sphere. They are the elite of Creation, and are charged with 
the administration of Divine affairs, under the supervision of the 
Divine Being — part of their mission having reference to the 
children of men, and especially to those who are the children of 
God, by faith in Christ Jesus. " Are they not all ministering 

289 



spirits, sent forth to minister for them who shall be heirs of salva- 
tion ? ' ' They are an immense multitude. They are not always 
in one place. They have errands through the Universe. 

" Angels our servants are, 

And keep in all our ways, 
And in their watchful hands they bear 

The sacred sons of grace." 

Heaven is the abode of the Saints. The saints are 
those members of the human race who have been created anew in 
Christ Jesus, and have passed the subsequent years of Probation 
in diligent endeavor to show forth His praise. 

They were not always saints. They were born, as other 
members of the race of Adam, without moral comeliness — beneath 
all the disabilities and under all the doom of the race of Adam, 
far away from original righteousness and all its fortunes and pos- 
sibilities and tendencies. 

They, however, as other members of the race of Adam, were 
born in the light of the Atonement of the Second Adam, the Lord 
from Heaven, — that amazing provision of the God of all grace, 
which holds in arrest, during our stay in infancy, the decree of 
death ; and, as they came to the plane of personal responsibility, 
availed themselves of this Atonement, in the way of its prescrip- 
tion, by a personal appropriation. 

Many were their difficulties, toils and trials. Many a time 
they were almost overwhelmed by the currents of sin and tempta- 
tion which surged around them. Many a time their feet almost 
slipped from the way thrown up for the journey of the elect to 
the delights and dignities of inalienable blessedness. But all the 
while, " by patient continuance in well doing," they sought for 
"glory and honor and immortality." All the while God was 
about them, and within them, with all His matchless reserves and 
supplements of grace. And thus they fought a good fight, fin- 
ished their course, and kept the faith. 

Therefore, having accomplished their days of waiting, and 
doffed their garments of work, their sundown came ; they thronged 

290 



up the steeps of rest ; opened their eyes amid the radiance of the 
clime where there is no need of the sun, for the Lord is its light ; 
and are before the throne, serving God day and night in His 
temple, hungering no more, thirsting no more, and all tears wiped 
away from their eyes — all occasion for tears precluded by the per- 
fection of their bliss. 

"Let all the saints terrestrial sing, 

With those to glory gone : 
For all the servants of our King, 

In earth and Heaven, are one." 

Heaven, however, has too many elements of enjoy- 
ment to allow now a distinct discussion of each. Ponder- 
ing the hints in reference to it which here and there shine out 
from the firmament of Revelation, I learn that in it there is one 
chief city. "Ye are come unto Mount Sion, and unto The city 
of the living God." " Him that overcometh will I make a pillar 
in the temple of My God, and he shall go no more out : and I will 
write upon him the name of My God, and the name of THE city 
of My God." 

I learn that in it are other cities. " Here have we no contin- 
uing city, but we seek one to come." "Well, thou good servant : 
because thou hast been faithful in a very little, have thou author- 
ity over ten cities." 

I learn that in it are rural regions — gardens, groves and 
streams. " And he showed me a pure river of water of life, clear 
as crystal, proceeding out of the throne of God and of the Lamb, 
in the midst of the street thereof. And on this side of the river 
and on that was a tree of life, bearing twelve manner of fruits, 
yielding its fruit every month. ' ' 

I learn that in it there are concerts. " And I looked, and, lo, 
a Lamb stood on the Mount Sion, and with Him an hundred forty 
and four thousand, having His Father's name written in their 
foreheads. And I heard a voice from Heaven, as the voice of 
many waters, and as the voice of a great thunder : and I heard the 
voice of harpers harping with their harps : and they sung as it 
were a new song." 

291 



I learn that in it there is worship. ' ' And after these things, 

I heard a great voice as of much people in Heaven, saying, Alle- 
luia ; Salvation, and glory, and honor, and power, unto the Lord 
our God." 

I learn that in it there are triumphal marches. ■ ■ And I saw 
as it were a sea of glass mingled with fire : and them that had 
gotten the victory over the beast, and over his image, and over 
his mark, and over the number of his name, stand on the sea of 
glass, having the harps of God. And they sing the song of 
Moses the servant of God, and the song of the Lamb, saying, 
Great and marvellous are Thy works, Lord God Almighty ; just 
and true are Thy ways, Thou King of saints. " 

I learn that in it there is continuance of the hallowed associ- 
ations of earth. " I shall go to him, but he shall not return to 
me." " Whom we preach, warning every man, and teaching 
every man in all wisdom ; that we may present every man perfect 
in Christ Jesus." "Now we see through a glass, darkly; but 
then face to face : now I know in part ; but then shall I know 
even as also I am known." 

I learn that in it there is the complete exclusion of all evil, 
and the perfect experience of all good. " And there shall be no 
more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be 
any more pain. " " Thou wilt show me the path of life : in Thy 
presence is fulness of joy ; at thy right hand there are pleasures 
for evermore." 

And I learn that in it there is constant and perpetual 
improvement in condition. ' ' Blessed are they that dwell in Thy 
house : they will be still praising Thee .... They go from strength 
to strength : every one of them in Zion appeareth before God." 

II The ransomed of the Lord shall return, and come to Zion with 
songs and everlasting ioy upon their heads." 

" For ever blessed they, 

Whose joyful feet shall stand, 
While endless ages pass away, 

Amid that glorious land ! " 

An immense multitude has its home in heaven. " In 

292 



My Father's house are many mansions." "They shall come 
from the east, and from the west, and from the north, and from 
the south, and shall sit down in the kingdom of God." " I 
beheld, and, lo, a great multitude, which no man could number, 
of all nations, and kindreds, and people, and tongues, stood 
before the throne, and before the Lamb, clothed with white robes, 
and palms in their hands ; and cried with a loud voice, saying, 
Salvation to our God which sitteth upon the throne, and unto the 
Lamb." 

"They see the Saviour face to face ; 

They sing the triumph of His grace ; 
And day and night, with ceaseless praise, 

To Him their loud hosannas raise." 

" Blessed be God, even the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, 
the Father of mercies, and the God of all comfort ; Who com- 
forteth us in all our tribulation," with the assurance of a better 
country ; Who walks by our side every step of our way through 
the wilderness, keeping us from breaking down beneath its 
burdens and perils, and whispering in our ears, Canaan is just 
over the river ! 

" For God has marked each sorrowing day, 

And numbered every secret tear ; 
And Heaven's long age of bliss shall pay 

For all His children suffer here." 

' ' Oh how great is Thy goodness, which Thou hast laid up for 
them that fear Thee ; which Thou hast wrought for them that 
trust in Thee before the sons of men !" 

1 ( Wherefore comfort one another with these words. " " Com- 
fort them which are in any trouble, by the comfort wherewith ye 
yourselves are comforted of God." Call to the disconsolate, 

" Deem not that they are blest alone 

Whose days a peaceful tenor keep ; 
The Anointed Son of God makes known 

A blessing for the eyes that weep." 

Nor ever let your own hope of eternal life fade out. Never 
fear that the celestial continent for which you long ago set sail is 
a myth. Never think of turning the prow of your vessel the 

293 



other way. Steer cheerily straight forward. Hist ! fellow-sail- 
ors, these are the land-breezes fanning our faces. These are the 
birds of Paradise that are careering over our heads. These are 
the flowers and fruits of the Garden of God that are floating 
toward us. These are songs of angels that we hear. And, hist ! 
yon, that we took for clouds, are the hills of Heaven. Yonder 
are its groves and meadows. Yonder are gleaming forth its spires 
and turrets. Yonder, yonder, are our darlings. See, see, they 
know us. They are kissing their hands to us. They are beckon- 
ing us onward. And yonder is Jesus ; 

" And Jesus bids us come." 

And here is the Holy Spirit, to be our Pilot in. Land ahead! 
Land ahead ! 

" O sweet and blessed country, 

The home of God's elect ! 
O sweet and blessed country 

That eager hearts expect ! " 



294 



XXXI. 

" But as we were allowed of God to be put in trust with the Gospel, 
even so we speak ; not as pleasing men, but God, which trieth our hearts." 

—I. THBSSAI.ONIANS, 2 \ 4. 

As a Divine provision for the redemption and rehabilitation 
of disinherited and homeless humanity, the Gospel, with all its 
precious deposit of agencies and truths, in the immensity of Divine 
grace has come into our possession. With us are all its manifold 
discoveries and potencies, and, if we have allowed it to have its 
way with us, all its peace and prospects. And, of course, it is in- 
cumbent on us to hail its advent with gratitude, ponder its revela- 
tions with serious interest, submit to all its requirements with sin- 
cere obedience, turn all its teachings into our daily practice, and 
use all its offers with hearty welcome and will. But it has not ac- 
complished all its business with us when it has accomplished our 
personal redemption and rehabilitation — when it has wrought our 
deliverance from perdition and heirship to Paradise. 

As its Giver gives it to us for ourselves, He puts it into our 
hands in trust for our fellow-beings. Full of compassion for all 
who are in need, the thoughts of mercy which surge through the 
bosom of the Lord of all are not concentrated on any one individual 
or section of humanity. The atonement which cost Him the abase- 
ment and crucifixion of His only-begotten Son is not in the exclu- 
sive interest of any one fragment of mankind. His purpose in the 
creation of man was the greatest felicity, possible to him, of every 
man. There having occurred the universal forfeiture of the 
original inheritance, His pleasure is the universal restoration of 
that inheritance. Seeing one prodigal returning to the old home- 
stead, He bids him an assuring welcome. He then commissions 
him as His agent, endorses him with His seal, endows him with 
His fulness, and summons him to the earnest search of all his 
fellow-prodigals. Ourselves found out in the cold and the night, 
lost on the mountain ; and then led back into the cheer and plenty 
and warmth of our Father's house, and provided with all needful 

295 



supplies ; we must immediately and steadily give ourselves to the 
rescue of the perishing. The reception of the Gospel is the 
assumption of an obligation for its publication. We, freely re- 
ceiving, are as freely to give. 

As this trust is put into our hands, there come upon us signal 
honor and mercy. Full of potencies as He is, the God of all 
grace is not dependent on our co-operation or our interest for the 
accomplishment of His designs, or the execution of His plans. 
He is not shut up to partnership with us for the working out of 
His purposes. He holds in His hands all the forces of matter. 
All the ranks of spirit forces are poised for His behests. He has 
myriads of means ever in readiness to run on His errands. He 
could do without us in the redemption of the world. Out of the 
stones He could gather children for His arms and toilers for His 
fields. It is, therefore, unconstrained by any lack of other agen- 
cies, that He allows us to be put in trust with the Gospel. 

It is to assure us of our acceptance into His favor, and of His 
faith in our consecration. A government is not apt to intrust its 
missions to those whose fealty is open to question. And, as God 
puts us in trust with the Gospel, He honors us with a mark of 
His confidence. 

It is also to declare our character. Men whose own disloyalty 
has been forgiven, and who have been reinvested with the im- 
munities of grace, have special fitness for the commendation of 
that grace to those whom they invite to amnesty. 

And it is to erect a basis for our remuneration. It is in His 
heart, on our submission to His sway, to do great things for us. 
He contemplates the bestowment of all His mercy ; but He chooses 
to condition it upon our fidelity. 

And it is to make us meet for increasing remuneration. It is 
the hand of the diligent that maketh rich ; and increasing oppor- 
tunities, duly improved, introduce other opportunities and lead to 
richer recompense. 

And it is to prepare the way of the Lord to universal hom- 
age. This is the inspiration of Paul in all his labors and suffer- 

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ings ; for, burdened with the consciousness of his own insufficiency, 
and glorying in the grace of Christ, he exclaims : " Unto me, 
who am less than the least of all saints, is this grace given, that I 
should preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of 
Christ ; and to make all men see what is the fellowship of the 
mystery, which from the beginning of the world hath been hid in 
God, Who created all things by Jesus Christ : to the intent that 
now unto the principalities and powers in heavenly places might 
be known by the Church the manifold wisdom of God ; according 
to the eternal purpose which He purposed in Christ Jesus our 
Lord, in Whom we have boldness and access by the faith of Him." 
Diligent diffusion and representation of the Gospel we have 
in trust are expected of us. Becoming possessed of its riches, 
and at the same time being made stewards of its riches for others, 
we are not to be stationary finger-boards dumbly indicating the 
path to its ample and luxurious fields ; nor pictures hung along 
the galleries of the Church ; nor soldiers in wax, ranged in a 
museum, whose epaulettes and weapons suggest only some notion 
of what we are supposed to represent. Finger-boards get no 
enthusiasm into their directions, and are often by the wind 
blown into many directions. Pictures put no inspiration into 
their hints, and often have their most important features sadly 
marred. Soldiers in wax can not talk, and have to be carefully 
handled in order to keep them from melting. It is ours to 
speak — speech being such expression of our thoughts and wishes 
as will convey them to other minds for their adoption and practice. 
It is not possible for any amplitude of knowledge, or intensity of 
feeling, or vehemence of volition, to relieve us of the obligation 
to expression. Knowledge and feeling and volition must be put 
into utterance. "A true witness delivereth souls." " A word 
spoken in season, how good it is." "Let the redeemed of the 
lyord say so." "The mouth of a righteous man is a well of 
life." "Hast thou heard the secret of God? and dost thou 
restrain wisdom to thyself?" "Ye that make mention of the 
Lord, keep not silence, and give Him no rest till He establish, 

297 



and till He make Jerusalem a praise in the earth. ' ' Nor is the 
speaking which is enjoined a mere utterance, without considera- 
tion or emphasis ; but it is to be as we are allowed of God: that is, 
as He directs and opens the way for us to speak. 

That we may be duly furnished ; that our speech may be with 
power ; and that no gainsayer may pertly ask, " How long shall 
the words of thy mouth be like a strong wind?" or tartly say, 
n Physician heal thyself," or shield his sin with our incon- 
sistency ; let our corresponding action enforce and illustrate our 
speech. Let us live as we talk. 

For the becoming execution of our trust, as stewards of the 
Gospel, we are under bonds to God. As a matter of course, men 
are infinitely concerned in our efficiency and fidelity ; for our 
efficiency and fidelity involve the deathless fortunes of others 
than ourselves. Many may attain to the resurrection of the just, 
and make their way in through the portals of the skies, only as 
we shall animate their pursuit and bear them company. Nor 
can we afford indifference to their estimate of the manner of our 
stewardship. It is no light matter to the executors of a trust, 
when the beneficiaries of that trust charge dishonesty in its 
administration. Moreover, if those for whom we have the Gospel 
in trust note indifference or negligence in our observance of its 
mandates to ourselves, our influence on them for good is gone. 
Still, our trust is of God — a trial which follows us into our very 
hearts. He bestows our trust ; directs as to its management ; 
has an eye on our manners and methods ; lends us all needful 
opportunity and resources and wisdom ; and will pronounce the 
award which will ban or bless us, "world without end." 
1 ' Every one of us shall give account of himself to God. ' ' 

Verily, it is an awful and solemn thing to be the depositories 
of God for other men and women. And for other men and 
women, as well as for ourselves, a trust of eternal and infinite 
preciousness is in our hands. We have the hearty consent of its 
Testator, in its administration, to use all of it we can and need for 
ourselves. But we may not withhold its largesses from the other 

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legatees. It is theirs as well as ours. Any failure to get it into the 
hands of our wards in the Gospel is, if in any way avoidable, not 
merely a failure, but a breach of trust — a breach which is aggra- 
vated in the ratio of our relationship to the defrauded. It is bad 
enough to defraud a distant and unknown creditor, or to wrong an 
utter stranger ; but to defraud our own flesh and blood, or to 
wrong our neighbor, seems to be an infamy of even darker hue. 
So, it is criminal to withhold the Gospel from those who dwell in 
the uttermost parts of the earth, if we can by any possibility 
carry it to their doors : and it is criminal to suffer sin upon a 
stranger within our gates, if we can by any means within our 
reach work his translation into the kingdom of the Son of God ; 
but how shall his criminality be measured or rated who, by his 
own delinquency or neglect or unconcern, cheats his own " kith 
and kin ' ' out of the income and legacy intrusted to him for deliv- 
ery to them ? During the campaign of Israel against Syria, an 
Israelitish soldier said to his king, ' ' Thy servant went out into 
the midst of the battle, and a man brought a man unto me, and 
said unto me, ' Keep this man, and if by any means he be miss- 
ing, thy life shall be for his life, or thou shalt pay a talent of 
silver ; ' and as thy servant was busy here and there he was 
gone." And the king said, "So shall thy judgment be : thyself 
hast decided it : " — admitting that another has lost through thy 
carelessness of a deposit accepted from his hands, thou admittest 
thy obligation to make good his loss ! It is the decision of the 
King of kings. He will not even accept the plea of attention to 
our own business as an excuse for the neglect of His business ; 
for He knows that there is no conflict between the two if ours be 
a lawful business, properly managed. 

Earthly courts punish, with especially severe penalties, dis- 
honest and neglectful executors and guardians and trustees ; and 
the severest sentences of the Heavenly Court are in waiting for 
those who, having the Gospel in trust, fail to righteously admin- 
ister their trust. If we can not, with all our diligence, find the 
parties, or if they will not receive their portion, our skirts are 

299 



clear ; but, dwelling beneath the same roof with them, or being in 
the same town with them, or meeting with them in the same 
church, or mingling with them in the same society, or transacting 
business with them in the same marts of trade, and wronging 
them where the wrong is for the eternal years, woe unto us if our 
Gospel is hidden to them who are lost ! 

Surely, fellow- trustees of the Gospel, we will not go out of 
this sanctuary without swearing with uplifted soul, if not with up- 
lifted hand, "Aswe are allowed of God to be put in trust with the 
Gospel, even so will we speak : not as pleasing men, but God 
which trieth our hearts ! " No honest follower of Christ can do 
less, and neither earth nor heaven can ask us to do more, than 
assume and keep the solemn oath. This much, with all our 
hearts, let us say ; and ever henceforth let our lives emphasize and 
illustrate what we say. Let countless multitudes witness to the 
saving efficacy of what we speak. Let the all-seeing God every 
day have to say of each of us, ''That man, that woman, has 
brought home another prodigal. ' ■ And along all the paths of our 
pilgrim feet, and as we drop our pilgrim staff, and in the solemn 
ordeal of final judgment, and through all the ages and realms of 
our beatific inheritance, may the Gospel which we have in trust 
for others be our own help and hope and Heaven ! 



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